Emily and I are close neighbors in the office.

Her station and my station are literally are almost back-to-back and in the same room with a scanner.

We were working away putting the newspaper together Tuesday afternoon just like thousands of Tuesday afternoons before when the scanner announced for Purcell Firemen to answer a fire alarm at Purcell Elementary.

It was just before 2 p.m.

Emily has two students in the building and same two are two of my grandchildren so we both immediately sat up with attention.

Quickly however, the dispatchers said 10-22 that call to the elementary school.

We could hear sirens on the radio as firefighters were making a mad dash to the school that houses about 300 students  and faculty.

Once again the dispatches said 10-22.

“I 10-22’d it.”

I knew what the 10 signal meant and immediately breathed a sigh of relief knowing the call had been called off.

But Emily didn’t. She didn’t know the 10-signal, which didn’t even cross my mind.

Several minutes pass before Emily tells her spouse and father of the two said two elementary students that fire had been dispatched to answer the fire alarm.

When John Denny said, “I guess we’d better go up there.”

That’s when I said but they 10-22’d it.

Not until I explained did Emily know the fire call was off. I felt bad but she didn’t hold any grudge.

Now she has learned one 10-signal.

Aside from there being no fire the good news is Emily learned a 10-signal.

jdm

I’m a little confused about how certain politicians view gun violence.

Last weekend six people were shot and killed in New York City and another 31 wounded by gunshots.

That same weekend, three people were killed in Chicago with another 21 shot.

And that’s just two cities out of hundreds in the country.

Why is there no outcry about those lives that were lost?

Why are those lives not as newsworthy as lives lost in other shootings?

Let’s all be clear. Gun violence at any level anywhere and anytime is horrible.

It is just strange to me that if people are shot at a movie theatre, in the workplace or at a concert it is so much worse than if they are shot in their homes or in their vehicles.

Dead is dead so why don’t the politicians that get up in arms about some shootings seemingly turn the other cheek to others?