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Kat Albrecht's avatar

What an incredibly beautiful, horrific, and thought provoking post Holly. As difficult as it must have been for you to relive your gun incident by writing this essay, you've taken your traumatic experience and wove it seamlessly into the terrible truth of guns in America. I think because I grew up in a city (Fresno, California, USA) with several competing gangs and a high crime rate, I became numb to hearing about weekly shootings on the news. So in 2015 when I first moved to Vancouver Island (British Columbia, Canada) with my husband Johnny, I was amazed that the top news stories on Vancouver Island were often things like a local logging protest, a humpback whale was hit by a ship, or a business burned down. I don't think we heard of a shooting in our area of the island until sometime in 2018. Admittedly there is growing gun violence but it is still weeks, or a few months, before you hear of a shooting. I also discovered that in order to have a handgun, you must take a gun safety course. And you must keep the gun unloaded in your house, and the ammo can't be near the unloaded gun. So basically in Canada they make it difficult to get shot. If you ask the typical American "What do you believe to be your fundamental right?" they will typically answer, "The right to bear arms." But when you ask the same question of a Canadian, they overwhelmingly answer, "The right to healthcare." Now wonder the difference in the culture.

But here's the thing I've noticed from having lived in an unsafe world and a very safe area: there will always be thugs with guns, people who're enraged who pull out their gun, people who're sociopaths who don't care about your safety when they go to shoot someone at the gym where you're just working out. I feel so bad that these are the risks you take living the nomadic life journey that you're on. But I sense from the maturity in your writing that you have already learned that you learn from both the good and the bad. Stay safe Holly!

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Marc Typo's avatar

Beautifully written and so many thoughts. But I loved the way you described this scene with the Spanish speaking couple. I could literally feel you the tension and you grappling with trying to find the words.

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