Life Continues To End

There was some snark floating around Al Gore's Internet in the past few weeks about how the good news in all this stay-at-home time is that there haven't been any school shootings.
Al Gore's Internet is where one expects to find snark, and as we roll past the twenty-first anniversary of the Big Daddy Of Them All, Columbine, it may give us a chance to reflect on the past couple decades. There is something profound to be said about having a home that is gun-free while kids are stuck inside it for months at a time. I am not suggesting that home-schooling could lead to filicide, but there are certainly memes floating around that previously mentioned network of computers giving that impression. Incels will be stuck at home this year along with everyone else, so not having a date to the prom will be removed as a motive for a killing spree.
So, if we don't have to worry about school shootings, I guess we don't have to worry about gun violence while the global pandemic grabs our waking attention.
Except Canada.
What?
Yes, our neighbors to the north experienced their worst mass shooting in Canadian history. A very bad man, dressed as a police officer moved through Nova Scotia, killing eighteen and setting fire to their homes. The homes in which they were sheltering to avoid being killed by a global pandemic. Disguised as a member of the Royal Mounted Canadian Police, he was able to move through a thirty mile area as residents were told to lock their doors and hide in their basements. The horror of an unseen virus was quickly replaced by the horror of a killer pretending to be a trusted first responder. One of the victims was a school teacher. Feel free at this moment to soak in the irony. Or don't. It's bitter and ugly.
Someday, this worldwide epidemic will be in the rearview mirror, and we will emerge from our cocoons to face the world after. Meanwhile, gun sales continue to surge. Shootings in urban areas go on as they have for years.
And we hope that a vaccine can be found. For senseless murder.