Today is my oldest kid's, Molly's, birthday, and she would have been 30 today if she wasn't dead from a gunshot, bringing to a close a rocky few years dealing with opioid addiction.

Miss you, kiddo.

Anyway, just typing it out loud. And also, let me share a link to one of the best essays I've ever read about America's completely fucked up relationship with the Second Amendment and private gun ownership. It looks like it recently went behind a Substack subscription, but it's archived, here:

https://archive.ph/kXbXd

Quoting:

One aspect of the gun debate that rarely gets mentioned because it’s overshadowed by mass shootings is the fact that widespread gun ownership creates elevated suicide rates. To put it bluntly, it’s much easier to commit suicide with a gun than with other methods.

As a result, the fact that it’s so easy to get a gun means that people who are experiencing suicidal thoughts are more easily able to act on them, spurring senseless and preventable tragedies. The US is home to just four percent of the global population, but home to, by far, the largest proportion of suicides by firearm (44 percent of the total globally).