so long,

2am. Can’t sleep. Summer is here and normal-person sleep patterns are a thing of the past (and near future, unfortunately). I’ve always thought God had a good-natured laugh when he gave me the passion to be a teacher–I don’t know of a single elementary school that starts at noon–but then there’s summer. Every year I promise myself I will try to maintain a normal routine to make that fall transition easier. Something happens in June, though, and I morph into my college-student alter ego–2am Taco Bell runs (not as much fun when you aren’t in a car full of fellow dormmates), idiotic cable movies too stupid for prime time, reading book after book after book (except this time I get to CHOOSE what I read)–I might go to bed at 7pm, I might crash at 7am. I might crash at 7am, wake up at 1, then go back to bed at 7pm… life of luxury, right? Until I have to be somewhere at 8 in the morning (I actually use my summer to take classes, so I do have places to be…) and I’m on my 7am bedtime cycle. I REALLY screw up my body during the summer, and never fully recuperate during the school year. I just can’t help myself though–I’m a night person. I LOVE nighttime, and I don’t want to miss it by sleeping through it! The quiet, the peace, the breeze, the stars and moon–day is fine, but night is perfect.

Last April, the country was rocked by the news of a massacre at Virginia Tech, and the media frenzy began once again as it has so pervasively after similar tragedies on American soil. My heartfelt sympathy goes out to the families, friends, and victims of these tragedies.

But even as the grief of these victims and their families are immeasurable, I find myself reimagining the tragedy through a global lens…

What if, instead of 32 people, FOUR HUNDRED had been brutally and mercilessly murdered without reason or warning.

Now imagine that the SAME THING happened again TOMORROW…

…and continued to happen EVERY DAY for the next FOUR YEARS.

Welcome to Darfur, Sudan.

Now imagine that instead of 400, the number of people murdered on the Virginia Tech campus had been SIX THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED. And the same thing happened TOMORROW, and continued to happen EVERY DAY, at the rate of 6500 a day, for the next FOUR MONTHS.

Welcome to Rwanda, 1994.

The simple truth is, that while our grief is no less profound nor our tragedies no less tragic, we have become comfortably insulated in our own little (and I use the world “little” very deliberately here to emphasize the small part of the planet that we actually occupy) first-world country with little awareness of the atrocities that happen every day somewhere else in the world. We see the CNN headlines of the day when we check our email and call ourselves “aware.” But true awareness does not occur until you FEEL the headline of the day and it makes you want to THROW UP.

I realize I may sound self-righteous here, and I will take this opportunity to admit that I am as guilty as anyone else. My editorial applies just as much to myself as it does to anyone else.

My purpose, though, is to put things in perspective in a more global way. With the insight we gain from the horrific events in April, and while we mourn the senseless deaths of 32 of our own, let’s also mourn the millions of people who have been, and continued to be, slaughtered relentlessly around the world every day.

And then, let’s ACT.