Parkland survivors offer hope that something might finally change

A lot can change in a week.

Seven days ago, 17 lives were needlessly lost in the horrific shooting in Parkland, Fla. My first awareness of it came via Twitter, before any details were available. Another school shooting. The all-too-familiar depression and hopelessness that washes over me during these incidents struck me harder and harder as information was reported. Many injured ... multiple fatalities ... more than 10 deaths ... then, finally, 17 dead. And eventually a grim sense of relief that the count had finally stopped going up.

Happy Valentine's Day.

I had taken the afternoon off to buy and prep a steak for our traditional Valentine's cookout. But by the time my wife got home from work I didn't feel much like celebrating anything. It felt wrong to be grilling--to be doing anything I enjoyed--with such a tragedy for all intents still unfolding, knowing so many families were being irrevocably torn apart. I felt more like crying than anything else. But I put my best face on, partially because I still don't want to talk about things like this in front of my son. He's 8. He shouldn't have to know these kinds of things happen.

The muddy fence

Every morning during the week, I wait for the school bus with my son out in front of our house. Yesterday morning something looked different. It took my brain half a second or so to process it, because it was so unexpected. An entire panel of my neighbor's fence had been turned from white to black.

Theirs is a corner house, and over the years they've been victims of a number of lawn jobs, which sadly seem to happen on a semi-regular basis here in Suburbia. This time, however, it appears to have been an inside job.

Those tracks in the snow come from the driveway, where I'm guessing someone was blocked in. There are five driver-age occupants there, requiring quite a bit of car shuffling at times. My working hypothesis is someone was parked in, decided it would be quicker to pull across the lawn than get the blocking vehicle moved, got stuck, and spun their tires until the sky rained mud.

I only wish I could have seen it, because it must have been spectacular. I mean, if you look close enough, you can see mud on the fence surrounding their pool in the backyard. How high must have it been arching through the air? I bet it was beautiful. In a dirty, muddy sort of way. And in the way that things like this are always more spectacular when it's not your fence.