In light of recent events

Yesterday was a day full of fear and unpleasant things.

I woke up yesterday at my normal hour of 7:30.  I carried out my normal routine. I went to class in Electrical Engineering for two hours, departed for physics for potentially another three, and was fortunate to finish lab an hour early.    I received a call from my mother prior to physics lab where she gave me the unfortunate news that she had melanoma. It started to stress me out considerably, as one could imagine.

I learned that there was a shooting as I was getting ready to leave lab. A girl looked over at me and said "You aren't going outside, are you? There was a shooting in Electrical!" I decided that the lock down in effect was inconvenient and that I wanted to return to my dormitory.  At that point I had heard that there was only one shooter, one victim. As it turned out this was the most accurate information.

When I returned I was told by two different sources (both unreliable, as they got their news from a faulty source themselves) that there was possibly a second shooter on the loose. Images started to flow in of the plain-clothes officers outside buildings with assault rifles. People were hearing mixed messages from friends and the news was not up to date yet.  We knew one person had died and one person was in custody, but that was it.

It felt all day like I had been punched in the gut. I had heard that the 'second shooter' had gone to physics, which didn't make me feel any better about my decision to reportedly take the route I did.  But ultimately, what hurts me most, is that I fell victim to the rumor mill. I heard things, I panicked. I originally was thinking logically, but I forgot to keep that attitude up.

It hurts, knowing your mind has failed you during a crisis and has resorted to panic. Bah.  And in the midst of it all, the confusion was massive. If it had been a mass shooting rather than a planned homicide, there would have been a lot more casualties. People didn't understand what was going on, people didn't know how to secure their classrooms, people (like me) didn't realize that they had to take the situation seriously.

And to the victim's family, friends, and acquaintances I am sorry. I hope that you will recover, I hope you know that your son has left a great legacy. Bah. This just sucks.