Ignorance is Bliss

To be completely honest, I do not watch the news. I do not read the newspaper, nor do I check the news on my phone or laptop. I purposely choose not to stay up to date with current events. I know I am usually the last person among my friends and family to know what is going on in the world, but I prefer to be in the dark. Maybe for me, "ignorance is bliss"?

Staying up to date on the happenings of the world around me is much too stressful for me. I tend to internalize everything I see and experience, both good and bad. So much of the news is violent, negative and downright horrifying that it hurts me to watch or read it. Now don't get me wrong, I do understand how important it is for me to stay informed, but I have made the conscious decision to avoid the news. Sometimes I find my running from the news absurd, as I was raised in a household that read the newspaper and watched multiple news programs nightly, yet I currently rely on my family and friends to tell me what's going on in the world.

That being said, it was late Monday afternoon when my mother-in-law came over to watch the boys, so I could leave for work. She was the one that told me about the shooting that happened in Las Vegas Sunday night. I was dumbfounded. I could not believe that someone would do such a horrifying act seemingly unprovoked. When I arrived at work, my coworkers were talking about it and the images that they saw online, warning me not to look, because they were so graphic and sad. I listened to my coworkers and chose not to look at those images. I did, however, for the first time in a long time, look up some news on the shooting, just because I couldn't understand it at all. I thought, that, maybe gaining more information on it, would help me to digest it, but it hasn't.

During my brief news search on the Las Vegas shooting, I watched a clip of Jimmy Kimmel talking about the shooting and making the argument to change our current gun laws. While I am not a gun activist nor am I against guns, I do not think that is the answer. The problem is, even if something is illegal, if somebody wants to get their hands on it, they can and they will. If I understand this particular case correctly, the shooter altered the guns himself to make them fully automatic and he bought them legally. So it doesn't seem like a change in the gun laws would have prevented this particular incident. I'm not sure what would have prevented it. 

I don't have an answer to preventing devastating things like this from happening in the future. I'm not sure that our government has the answer either. Unfortunately some things are just out of our control, though we don't like to think so. I don't know why things like this keep happening, nor why they keep getting worse with more and more casualties. 

I do know that I am not going to live my life in fear. I trust that everything happens as it is suppose to, both good and bad. 

I am a Native Nevadan, born and raised. Though I have never lived in Las Vegas, I have many friends that do. For me this shooting hits close to home. My husband and I were supposed to be in Las Vegas that day for a friend's wedding, but were unable to attend for various reasons. I often wonder why things work out the way they do.

My thoughts and prayers are with those in Las Vegas who have suffered from this tragic incident and their families too.