Our son Galen was killed in a school shooting on December 14, 1992. Each year on that date our whole family — brother, sister, parents, aunts, uncles, cousins and whatever friends happen to be around — go to the cemetery and put up a little Christmas tree over Galen’s grave. It’s sad, of course, that he’s with us only in memory, but it’s actually a happy event as well, something we can still do WITH Galen. In 2012, as we were walking back from the cemetery, our daughter looked up from her phone and said, “You won’t believe what just happened!” Sandy Hook. Twenty years later. To the day.
Of course our hearts flew out to those people; we had some idea what they were experiencing. That was the moment I went “all in” in the fight against gun violence. It continues to amaze me how many people reacted to that tragedy in just the same way. Sandy Hook was the tipping point for so many of us. I always wonder why it didn’t affect everyone that way? Doesn’t everyone understand that each act of gun violence wounds us all?