Something for the first time

Have you heard that new-ish Darius Rucker song?  "When was the last time you did something for the first time?"  Tonight my answer would be - today, because today all four of us attended the local March for Our Lives event.  I'd never been to a political march before.  We gathered at our county courthouse.  I don't know how many people were there but the mayor announced that they'd had to close the streets when they hadn't planned to, so kudos to all of us for showing up and exceeding expectations.

The hardest part of attending this event for me was preparing to go.  I knew it was an event I wanted to go to but didn't relish the idea of going down to DC and braving the crowds.  When I found out about the local event I resolved to make it happen, because 30 minutes away from home is feasible.  But with our regular grandparent-babysitters out of town, Hubby T and I had to decide how we felt about bringing the boys with us.  As a licensed psychologist said on a podcast I listened to yesterday, our instinct as parents is to shield.  Although we've opened the door to talk about school shootings with Little B we haven't gone there with him yet, and certainly not with Little P.  So at dinner last night we had this conversation:

- What are guns?
- Our Constitution gives us the right to own guns.
- But some people don't use their guns responsibly and people have gotten hurt, sometimes even people in schools, which are one of the safest places to be.
- So we're going to go to a march tomorrow to send a message to our government that we want them to do something about it.

That launched us into a conversation about what's a march?  When I mentioned some people have signs, Little B asked if he could make a sign.  I hadn't planned on that but I was so excited that he recognized that idea as a way he could participate.  Then Little P came up with this wording, and they were ready.

The march itself ended up being more of a rally (i.e. no actual marching, unless they did that after we left, 1 hour and 40 minutes of speeches later, the boys were pretty done).  I know they didn't get much out of what was said but that's okay.  I took them knowing that I might have to answer some pretty hard questions about things they heard, so far nothing's emerged. 

For now it's enough to know that we were part of something pretty big today.  It's enough to know that we all lived into our rights as American citizens to speak our mind and call out rulers when they let us down.  It's enough to know that we taught the boys by example of something you can do as a citizen of God's Kingdom, when something isn't right and you want to live out your responsibility as a child of God to help make it right.  But it's certainly not enough to stop here.  I have some legislators to call this week, how about you?

When was the last time you did something for the first time?