Where Do I Begin?

I have been mulling over three utterly different subjects for this post. I could either describe our recent trip to Vermont (fun), the lovely stone and mosaic step that Bob and I constructed outside my studio (useful), or the scary meeting Bob and I attended about passing an ordinance prohibiting the carrying of gun in public places in our town (weird). As you can see (sort of) from the above picture, I chose to write about an "interesting" (in all the worst ways!) experience...
I had received- and not paid too much attention to- emails about a Southbury town meeting that was so well attended and so large, that it had to be postponed and moved to the high school auditorium. It was a meeting about an attempt to pass an ordinance that would prohibit the carrying of guns on public property. I also received a phone call from a woman on the Democratic Town Committee who explained what was involved. Bob and I decided to attend.
As you can see from the above picture (which is a re-photo of a shot posted on a news website) there was quite a crowd. We, the gun safety proponents, were on one side of the main doorway and they, the gun advocates, were on the other. We sized each other up.

Bob was initially hesitant to actually go into the auditorium (as were other people that we talked to outside) but I was pretty adamant that we were here, we should hear what people were presenting as arguments. It was packed and lines formed for attendees to testify. We had been handed signs that announced we were residents of Southbury, and this mattered as many of the gun supporters had been urged to attend even if they lived in other towns. I had checked the CCDL website and learned that they were actively encouraging members to attend and "wear CCDL swag". I think the majority of the pro-gun people were out-of-towners as I didn't recognize many of them...
There was an introduction by the resident state trooper about what is in the actual existing gun laws. There is apparently a bit of room for interpretation in the carrying in public places rule that is already on the books; a murky "need for a special license". 
Residents from our town and surrounding towns then addressed the Board of Selectmen. Many spoke movingly about being from Sandy Hook (the next town over from us) and how crazy it is to allow- or promote! the idea that we're safer if we're all "packing". I was entirely in agreement with the woman who said simply, "I don't want to think about the person next to me at the library carrying a gun. Or the person next to me while I'm licensing my dog or paying my taxes..." But it was disheartening to hear the people who gave their ideas about the 2nd amendment and how it was their right to bear arms. It was terrifying and I seriously began to wonder what I was thinking, encouraging Bob and myself in coming into this auditorium to be surrounded by so many gun totin' whack jobs! I felt my eyes opening wider and wider and I started breathing so that I thought I'd hyperventilate; it was not a good place to be. PTSD, anyone?
Ultimately, we stayed through about a third of the speakers and then left. We had had enough. Honestly? The police on duty (and there were more present then I've ever seen before in town (except at the local pizza joint) looked a bit uneasy, too.

But we got tee shirts and placards and buttons and I plan on wearing my tee shirt to work. I have requested that the auction house be declared "a gun free zone" as I know that several of my co-workers think very differently from me about their right to bear arms.
And this meeting took place after Las Vegas but before the (most recent mass) shooting at the church in Texas! And don't forget the shooting at a Walmart in Colorado, in which it was described that the gun man "nonchalantly" opened fire on people shopping!* Good grief! where does this end? Cynically, I still fear that if the death of 26 children and their educators didn't provoke a change in the gun laws, then what will? And how did we all wind up in a replay of The Wild Wild West?

*Interestingly, the argument was raised that if everyone has a gun and starts shooting at the person who initially started shooting, when the police arrive, how on earth are they supposed to know who the "good guys" or the "bad guys" are? And the two men who pursued the shooter in Texas were driving at 90 miles an hour and shooting. What if they had shot an innocent bystander? Or caused a traffic accident? And how did they really know the story behind who was shooting? Too many disturbing details...