FRAIDY CAT

“Fraidy Cat! Fraidy Cat!” was often yelled on the playground of my grade school. I did some dangerous things to avoid having it hurled at me.

A few days ago I was sitting in our village coffee shop with women in my age group. They thought I was still taking chances when I shop alone in our county seat. The media reports of shootings in the city prompted my neighbor, Jan, to ask, “Aren’t you afraid?”

I replied, “No, I’m not a Fraidy Cat. I believe in living my life.”

The media also recently reported two couples in their seventies were attacked by gunmen during home invasions. One pair lived in an elite, city neighborhood and the other in the surrounding rural county. Both areas are considered ‘safe’.

Earlier the local gathering spots were abuzz about the shooting that occurred in our village park where I love to walk in the afternoon. About eight-thirty on a Saturday evening, two young men had a dispute. One settled it with gunfire. The volunteer fire department ambulance took the victim to an area hospital for treatment of a non-life-threatening injury. The perpetrator was arrested a short time later in another small town about thirty miles south.

Those incidents barely made the news because they’re happening all over all of the time. In olden days, folks turned to witch doctors with magic spells to ward off evil. Today, people implore our senators and representatives to solve these problems with more legislation. I think each of those remedies does about the same amount of good. More gun restrictions will not prevent crimes because those armed men and others like them are not law abiding citizens.

What do you think is the answer?