cancer

we lived 20 minutes from Sandy Hook 10 years ago, and Uvalde is an hour from where I was born and lived until I was 5-years-old. the whole tragedy feels even closer. the fact that this happened 10 years after Sandy Hook makes the head ache, the stomach knot. 19 children and 2 adults killed in Uvalde at their elementary school—10 days after 10 people were killed while shopping at a community centerpiece, the Tops grocery store closed to the Buffalo's East Side.

I found out Uvalde while wandering Seahurst Beach with a friend. she had looked at her phone to find a New York Times article about work replacing religion for  professionals. while grabbing that article, she saw the headline.

we walked in silence for some time after discovering the news and then sat on driftwood. she shared how different things are for her children than they were for her—and acknowledged too that her family's is a position of white privilege.

more and more often I wonder, and said out loud that day, if the human race will make it she said "oh, they'll survive. they're already fighting over mining the moon.  human beings will make it. they're going to ruin this and other planets. they are a cancer."