10 Years

It's been ten years since the Columbine Massacre. That I do remember in much greater detail- and I think my generation has been marked in ways that we can't understand, growing up and going to high school during the 1990s. Shooting after shooting and Columbine was the worst. It's a terrible thing, going to school, hanging out with your friends. High school in the United States is ultimately a social experience instead of an educational one. It's where you learn- or avoid social skills. It's the forge in which your personality is moulded. It's away from your parents, you can be independent- and more importantly, you feel practically immortal- in that special, arrogant kind of way that only teenagers can.

So imagine what that was like, growing up back there and back then, when suddenly school wasn't necessarily safe anymore. That's a shock to the national psyche to be sure, but to American high schoolers, it was a life-changing realization- an intrusion of the unremitting harshness of the 'real world' into our happy, safe little lives. People could get killed. Anger, could erupt into rage and explode into violence- and it could happen anywhere. Colorado, Arkansas, Kentucky... anywhere. Suburban schools, regular schools, big schools- even little schools... no one was safe. Innocence was shattered. I know that's an overused phrase, but it's true. What that experience will ultimately mean for my generation is still an open question. But I think we (generationally speaking) feel things like Columbine or Virginia Tech more deeply than most, as a result.

One of my most vivid memories in high school comes from later that year. The Bands and Choirs were out of town on their trip, so the school was sparsely populated to begin with- and, for reasons passing understanding, some people tried to stage a walkout because they thought the Assistant Principal was a dick. The walkout was pathetic (the students completely missing the point that the job description of an Assistant Principal usually includes 'being a dick.' They're in charge of discipline usually, which means they're not their to be your friend. The sooner high schoolers grasp this concept the better of they'll be.) And to top it all off, there were rumors flying that someone was going to bring a gun to school.

Nine times out of ten, teachers would have hushed it up, dismissed it as gossip and moved on. But that day, not too long after Columbine, no one knew what was going to happen. I remember sitting in English 10 Honors and listening to them telling us that. And the teachers were visibly on edge. And even though nothing happened that day, just the sight of teachers being visibly on edge was disconcerting enough.

Have we moved passed this? I'd like to think so. In the aftermath of VaTech there's been movement to let students and professors carry concealed weapons on campus. The argument being that armed, responsible adults could be in a position to prevent tragedies like this. Better parenting and less violent video games, less mayhem on television. Is it the culture? Is it the guns? Or is it just the fact that anger breeds resentment which builds up over time until it erupts into rage and violence?

I doubt we'll ever really know.