Share a smile today.

Two Dead in Shooting on Campus. That’s how the New York Times started my morning off. I almost skipped right over the article, I always try to avoid the really depressing stuff anyways. But the word campus caught my eye and I read on to find out that two students my age from University of Central Arkansas were dead this morning. Now geographically, I probably don’t have much in common with these students (honestly I’m not sure if I could even point Arkansas out on a map). But in the ways it counts, I have everything in common with them, and so do you. They probably woke up yesterday with that same Sunday feeling you did; stressed about an upcoming test, or reminiscing about the drunken things they did on Friday night. Maybe one of them argued with their mom about whether or not to walk at graduation. But not anymore. Now they’re just another tragedy.

It brings me back to the VTech shootings, or even (way back) to Columbine. How for a couple weeks after, everyone tries to be a bit nicer to their parents, smile at the kid you’ve never noticed in class before, yet, so quickly everyone goes back to their own selfish lives. I can’t force the world to care, to sit up and pay attention to the things in life that really matter. But I can change myself. I can remind myself when I get a parking ticket that it’s not a disaster; that two more dead IS. I can let it go when the guy in the big truck cuts me off, because somewhere, two more, one more, ten more- are dead. Their families are hurting, that deep, hard to breath hurt; their friends lives forever changed, in an instant.

So I’m going to work harder to smile at the waitress, or compliment someone I don’t know. And I’m going to look for the good in people. For the simple reason that I’m alive- and I can.