I’m a survivor of the Las Vegas mass shooting. Twenty-four hours after the experience and my eyes are still puffy and red. My stomach is still sour to the point I cannot eat. I only want to crawl into bed and stay there. Hide from the world. I think about the little things I need to do in my life to return to some semblance of normal. I think maybe I should go to the gym to run and release the stress. But then my next thought is, There’s only one exit in the front. If I needed to escape, how would I get out?
My best friend loves Jason Aldean. She was so excited to see him perform. I like country music but more than anything I was there for a fun weekend with her. For some reason on Sunday, the third and final day of the festival, neither of us was in the mood to drink. We weren’t hungover, just remarked that we weren’t ‘feeling it.’ That may have saved us. We made our way to the right side of the stage–close enough for a good view of the show.
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| My photo I uploaded to Snapchat moments before the shots started |
At about 9:40 pm, Aldean took the stage and we stood and sang along, enjoying ourselves. About four songs in, I heard four or five pops above me and to my right. And I knew. I knew it wasn’t fireworks. My friend turned around and looked at me and no doubt she saw the terror in my face. I said, “We need to get out of here.” We turned and ran. And then more shots were fired–it sounded like 30 to 40 in rapid succession. We dove to the ground. The shooting paused and we jumped up and ran. This repeated a few more times until we got far enough away that we felt safe to just run. We held hands and ran for our lives.
I knew that sound was not fireworks as many claimed when they rang out. I knew because the men closest to me are all owners of assault rifles. I’ve heard them. I’ve never shot one, but I’ve gone shooting with these men. I know that sound.
I grew up in a small town in Northern Arizona. The vast majority of the people in my life were hunters and proud Conservatives. I have several loved ones who served in the military. I was a staunch Republican myself for many years–even being a founding member of the Young Republicans club at my high school. My own father has been visited by the ATF for amassing such a large gun collection. I have a .38 revolver in my closet as I type this.
I have always been pro-Second Amendment. I know all the arguments. Bad guys will always find a way. The gun didn’t do it–the evil/deranged/mentally ill person did. If we take away guns, only the bad guys will have them. They’ll just use trucks or bombs or planes instead. Our founding fathers wanted us to be able to protect ourselves from the government. I know the arguments. Those words have sprung from my own lips.
Today I am a high school history teacher in a suburb of Phoenix. I left my small town, and my life experiences have changed me. Teaching in an inner-city school for years and just teaching American history itself has swayed my political beliefs to the center. I would never claim my opinions to be more valid than others. But my experiences have been different and so those opinions have changed. This has strained relationships, and even today I hung up on my father when he fed me the typical, “There’s nothing we can do” and those pro-Second Amendment arguments I know so well.
I feel more alone than ever. It seems that unless you have had to run for your life from an assault rifle firing hundreds of rounds on you in only minutes, you can’t understand. Some of the men closest to me are still clinging to those arguments knowing I was nearly killed a little more than 24 hours ago. They don’t understand. My friend and I say that over and over to each other. We are bonded that way–forever. And though I wish everyone could climb into my brain today and understand my heart, I would never want anyone to experience what I did.
So what can I do? I feel a growing sense of urgency that there must be something we can do. Something. I do not support banning guns entirely. I don’t. But I know we must do something. There must be actions we can take to make mass shootings less prevalent. Make it harder for someone to rain fire down on innocent people. Australia created laws. Why can’t we?
We will never rid the earth of evil. There will always be people out there with a sick desire to hurt and kill others with various motivations. And certainly, they will try to find a way. But why can’t we come together and discuss ways to make it harder for them? Put a few more obstacles in their path. I believe we can make laws that allow an individual to adequately defend their home and still impede others’ ability to commit mass shootings.
I love this country. I tell her stories, the good and the bad, every single day in my classroom. I stand with my students and salute the flag every morning. We love this land of the free. But I don’t feel free today. I am scared. I will never again feel safe in a large crowd. I will never again attend a concert or sporting event. I am forever changed. And I’m a mother of two incredible little people. I fear for them. We are not free when we have to live in fear. That’s not freedom.
Friends, please be willing to discuss solutions. Set aside your partisanship for a moment. Listen to each other. Think of ways you can help in a concrete way. The only thing I know to do is use my voice. The odds are that I may never sway the opinions of even some of those closest to me. But maybe I can sway someone. Maybe there will be enough people out there that do understand. Maybe we can come up with a sensible solution we can all live with. If not, I’ll just be another lucky survivor of a mass shooting. The next will happen and we’ll be shocked and sad. We’ll send prayers and love. And yet again we’ll do nothing. And it will continue, on and on…
