Red Thread Letter #886
These Are The Words
We say we have no words.
But these are the words.
Each time. Every time.
Read the names of the places, the people. Including those who were at cause. This is part of staying awake to what is happening. I know it is hard to face it. To know what to do about it. But to take informed action we must first confront what is so – otherwise we will not be empowered to act from a place of awareness.
I’m reading the names out loud. Chanting them.
If you don’t want to say the names yourself or sing them, I did it myself in my own feeble way. Not being a singer but using the chant tone of my ancestors if you would rather hear them read to you here.
However each of us chooses to engage with the great unfolding, or the great undoing, we are not powerless to become conscious and choose our role in the great showing up. Those of us who are creatives include the names in our paintings, our songs, our gardens. We weave the sorrowful dirge of the losses into our lives. Thinking we are separate from this – is part of our challenge. We can make a difference and we always have and we cannot give up. Ever.
Whatever else I do or actions I take – staying present to this awareness is essential for me and for us. Saying the names is part of not going numb. Yet each of us must be well enough to do this work and we aren’t always, all the time. So when we are well enough – there are words.
There are cruel and unstable people who take lives in every place in the world. Ask ourselves in the US – why is it so different here? Focusing on the specific why of each person who chooses to kill is often a diversion – we want to track motive. Give reason for madness. We want their personal why so we can blame and make sense of the senseless – blame their usage, their parents, their heritage, their mental health, the mental health system and so on. And this is human to seek the reason. Their reason connected with their choice of place, a school, a people, a village, a race, a sex, a dance – the choice of focus is a symptom not of one person, but of the state of a nation. I do not want to focus on individual motive alone – far from it – instead I want to focus on the motive of this nation’s collective negligence regarding gun laws and control and attitude. Can you hold a nation accountable for lost lives based on their laws. We should.
I also choose to make tragedy personal enough to connect. What is my relationship with guns? I grew up in houses with guns but only when there was a man in the house. I know their reasons why they think they should have them. I have heard it and heard it well. I also know a gun passed down from father to child – ended up being the chosen weapon of that child when they took their life, in our family. We know accessibility to these weapons IS a huge part of the challenge – how it all works together for harm. Sure criminals will always find them, but many many others would not. So there is the access conversation. Recently when my own father died, I found it quite curious, for reasons I won’t get into – that the first thing removed from the house by people who knew him, was his guns. I hate guns. And being married to a Veteran, who has a commitment to never pick up a gun for any reason based on the ptsd of having lived through conflict, has been a part of my own education. What is your family story regarding guns or gun control? We all have them one way or another. Connect with it – in order to FEEL what is real for you – to take action based on your true feeling on the matter.
Protecting guns instead of protecting children and protecting those who are targeted because of race or gender.
There will be crime. There will be murder. But we don’t need to be an accomplice – But we are.
My heart aches along with yours. I had to find words, however flawed they may be. There are lots of petitions to sign. Actions to take. Please post freely below the ones you are focusing on.
These are the words for this day. Other days and other tragedies have their own list of words. For today – chanting these words Connected with these places on earth, with these losses and all who are who are impacted.
And still I pray for healing, even while not believing it is near, at all.
Thurston High School.
Columbine High School.
Heritage High School.
Deming Middle School.
Fort Gibson Middle School.
Buell Elementary School.
Lake Worth Middle School.
University of Arkansas.
Junipero Serra High School.
Santana High School.
Bishop Neumann High School.
Pacific Lutheran University.
Granite Hills High School.
Lew Wallace High School.
Martin Luther King, Jr. High School.
Appalachian School of Law.
Washington High School.
Conception Abbey.
Benjamin Tasker Middle School.
University of Arizona.
Lincoln High School.
John McDonogh High School.
Red Lion Area Junior High School.
Case Western Reserve University.
Rocori High School.
Ballou High School.
Randallstown High School.
Bowen High School.
Red Lake Senior High School.
Harlan Community Academy High School.
Campbell County High School.
Milwee Middle School.
Roseburg High School.
Pine Middle School.
Essex Elementary School.
Duquesne University.
Platte Canyon High School.
Weston High School.
West Nickel Mines School.
Joplin Memorial Middle School.
Henry Foss High School.
Compton Centennial High School.
Virginia Tech.
Success Tech Academy.
Miami Carol City Senior High School.
Hamilton High School.
Louisiana Technical College.
Mitchell High School.
E.O. Green Junior High School.
Northern Illinois University.
Lakota Middle School.
Knoxville Central High School.
Willoughby South High School.
Henry Ford High School.
University of Central Arkansas.
Dillard High School.
Dunbar High School.
Hampton University.
Harvard College.
Larose-Cut Off Middle School.
International Studies Academy.
Skyline College.
Discovery Middle School.
University of Alabama.
DeKalb School.
Deer Creek Middle School.
Ohio State University.
Mumford High School.
University of Texas.
Kelly Elementary School.
Marinette High School.
Aurora Central High School.
Millard South High School.
Martinsville West Middle School.
Worthing High School.
Millard South High School.
Highlands Intermediate School.
Cape Fear High School.
Chardon High School.
Episcopal School of Jacksonville.
Oikos University.
Hamilton High School.
Perry Hall School.
Normal Community High School.
University of South Alabama.
Banner Academy South.
University of Southern California.
Sandy Hook Elementary School.
Apostolic Revival Center Christian School.
Taft Union High School.
Osborn High School.
Stevens Institute of Business and Arts.
Hazard Community and Technical College.
Chicago State University.
Lone Star College-North.
Cesar Chavez High School.
Price Middle School.
University of Central Florida.
New River Community College.
Grambling State University.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Ossie Ware Mitchell Middle School.
Ronald E. McNair Discovery Academy.
North Panola High School.
Carver High School.
Agape Christian Academy.
Sparks Middle School.
North Carolina A&T State University.
Stephenson High School.
Brashear High School.
West Orange High School.
Arapahoe High School.
Edison High School.
Liberty Technology Magnet High School.
Hillhouse High School.
Berrendo Middle School.
Purdue University.
South Carolina State University.
Los Angeles Valley College.
Charles F. Brush High School.
University of Southern California.
Georgia Regents University.
Academy of Knowledge Preschool.
Benjamin Banneker High School.
- H. Conley High School.
East English Village Preparatory Academy.
Paine College.
Georgia Gwinnett College.
John F. Kennedy High School.
Seattle Pacific University.
Reynolds High School.
Indiana State University.
Albemarle High School.
Fern Creek Traditional High School.
Langston Hughes High School.
Marysville Pilchuck High School.
Florida State University.
Miami Carol City High School.
Rogers State University.
Rosemary Anderson High School.
Wisconsin Lutheran High School.
Frederick High School.
Tenaya Middle School.
Bethune-Cookman University.
Pershing Elementary School.
Wayne Community College.
J.B. Martin Middle School.
Southwestern Classical Academy.
Savannah State University.
Harrisburg High School.
Umpqua Community College.
Northern Arizona University.
Texas Southern University.
Tennessee State University.
Winston-Salem State University.
Mojave High School.
Lawrence Central High School.
Franklin High School.
Muskegon Heights High School.
Independence High School.
Madison High School.
Antigo High School.
University of California-Los Angeles.
Jeremiah Burke High School.
Alpine High School.
Townville Elementary School.
Vigor High School.
Linden McKinley STEM Academy.
June Jordan High School for Equity.
Union Middle School.
Mueller Park Junior High School.
West Liberty-Salem High School.
University of Washington.
King City High School.
North Park Elementary School.
North Lake College.
Freeman High School.
Mattoon High School.
Rancho Tehama Elementary School.
Aztec High School.
Wake Forest University.
Italy High School.
NET Charter High School.
Marshall County High School.
Sal Castro Middle School.
Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School
Great Mills High School
Central Michigan University
Huffman High School
Frederick Douglass High School
Forest High School
Highland High School
Dixon High School
Santa Fe High School
Noblesville West Middle School
University of North Carolina Charlotte
STEM School Highlands Ranch
Edgewood High School
Palm Beach Central High School
Providence Career & Technical Academy
Fairley High School (school bus)
Canyon Springs High School
Dennis Intermediate School
Florida International University
Central Elementary School
Cascade Middle School
Davidson High School
Prairie View A & M University
Altascocita High School
Central Academy of Excellence
Cleveland High School
Robert E. Lee High School
Cheyenne South High School
Grambling State University
Blountsville Elementary School
Holmes County, Mississippi (school bus)
Prescott High School
College of the Mainland
Wynbrooke Elementary School
UNC Charlotte
Riverview Florida (school bus)
Second Chance High School
Carman-Ainsworth High School
Williwaw Elementary School
Monroe Clark Middle School
Central Catholic High School
Jeanette High School
Eastern Hills High School
DeAnza High School
Ridgway High School
Reginald F. Lewis High School
Saugus High School
Pleasantville High School
Waukesha South High School
Oshkosh High School
Catholic Academy of New Haven
Bellaire High School
North Crowley High School
McAuliffe Elementary School
South Oak Cliff High School
Texas A&M University-Commerce
Sonora High School
Western Illinois University
Oxford High School
Robb Elementary School
Sharing this list from a friend with three young children who shared it with me.
