Struggles

Like every parent, I struggled to cope after hearing about the mass shooting at an elementary school in Connecticut last week.
I struggled with the loss those other parents were feeling. I struggled with the horror, the tragedy, the uncertainty.
And like most news gatherers, I struggled with the news that day.
I kept the television off and followed the events on reputable news sources. Unfortunately, those sources didn’t turn out to be so reputable during the immediate hours following the shooting.
We are at such an awkward point in communication right now. Our news media and social media allow us to GETTHEINFORMATIONOW. As you know, it results in mis-information being released, reposted, retweeted. Unnamed sources being quoted, quotes reposted, retweeted. New information comes out, someone blogs about it, the blog is re-posted. Facebook photos are passed around, commented on, reposted, retweeted. Everyone gets confused, what was real news?
I don’t have the answers, obviously. Nobody has all the answers after something like this happens. When things settle down though, it’ll be a good time to have a conversation about how these kinds of things work, and how they should work. How they affect us, how they change us, or should change us.
I know how it changed me.
I sang, “You are my sunshine” to my two-and-a-half year old daughter that night before she went to bed, just like I do every other night. But, this time, it was different. I could only think about how those parents don’t ever get to sing their goodnight songs to their little kids anymore. Ever again.
Kerrie Lindecker is the editor of the Healdsburg Tribune and a mother of two.