Confession time-I am, or was, a news junkie.  One of the main reasons I suppose for so many years I loved to watch "The News" is because my parents watched it every night; I grew up watching Walter Cronkite...and in LA it was "Sexy" Stu Nahan on the local ABC affiliate.  After leaving LA and moving to the Front Range of Colorado I found that watching the local news helped me to learn the names of all communities and where they were,  keep up with the local buzz and generally feel more connected to my new home.  Once married we moved around considerably with the US Navy and corporate jobs, and in each location I would quickly find a local station I could trust for news and weather. When we lived on the islands of Guam and later Oah'u, as well as the coast of South Carolina, the weather forecasters became fundamental during typhoon/hurricane season.  In Central Indiana and Central Oklahoma accurate tornado forecasting and reporting could be a life saver. Yes, there was a day in Oklahoma that I had Gary England on the TV as he was tracking a tornado that was headed straight for our town, as the kids came home from school and the sirens went off I put my son, his friend and one of our dogs in the bathtub of the innermost bathroom of our house.  My daughter, the other dog and myself went into the bathroom under the stairs, all the while I could hear the tornado sirens as well as Gary England's voice...and I knew when it was safe to come out when Gary gave the all clear for Stillwater. My daughter is a student at OU in Norman, OK and I watched Gary live streaming on the internet the day Moore, OK was hit...so I knew when she was in the clear.  Yes, "The News" proved to be a lifeline!

When we lived in Washington DC, in the early 1990's there was always a "murder count" on the news...that's right, a daily tally of the number of people killed by acts of violence within the Washington DC boundaries.  I found this to be disturbing on many levels, yet I would faithfully watch "The News" every night.  

Although the evening news reports on car crashes, fires, assaults, Amber Alerts, impending weather doom, and the occasional feel-good story, they rarely tell the whole story or what happens after the story airs.    I know this first hand... and although I don't want the whole world to know what happened "after" the story, I think the viewing public should try to understand a few things in order to show empathy or at least be a little better educated.

In my blog Thoughts About a High School Shooting I gave my account of the events of that day. That was just my account...everyone who works or goes to school there has their own story and along with their story is another separate story of pain, fear, anger, and stages of healing.  This is what "The News" doesn't tell you.  "The News" does not tell you about the sleepless nights or the nightmares; the panic attacks or sudden outbursts of anger; how the children of the staff members who were so scared even after they found out Mom or Dad was OK,  or those same children who witnessed a parent breakdown from the fear, stress, exhaustion, and are now struggling to figure out how to reconcile seeing their childhood 'hero' with this person who is sobbing uncontrollably because of the evil that entered their life, are now struggling too.  "The News" doesn't tell you that well meaning people will try to comfort you with shallow platitudes and cruel people will tell you that you have "no right" to be anxious because you were not the one being shot at (as IF we knew that at the time). No, "The News" doesn't tell you that, unlike the common cold, this would take a long time to heal...it is a marathon of healing.

There was reporter from a local news affiliate trying to get into the church where so many of us had been evacuated to, doing everything possible to get "the real story" yet even after I told her in no uncertain terms, "NO!"  she still resorted to pulling out her cell phone and getting a video capture of cold, scared, worried parents standing in line to get their children, that was her job, to cover the breaking news. Thankfully in the days and weeks that followed reporters were kept at bay, giving us a respectable space.  The only ones they spoke to were the ones that sought out the media.  What "The News" doesn't tell you is that there are people who have begun to laugh, some who walk through the hallways with a smile on their face.  Kids who, on Dec 12th, were virtually unknown by many are now befriended by others they met and perhaps shared a blanket with on that horrible day. The Sheriff made a comment about how evil entered the school that day, but I can tell you that goodness has taken it's place.

What "The News" doesn't tell you is probably uninteresting in a world which revolves around social media...and most of the information on social media is inaccurate at best so perhaps what they don't tell us is probably best found out with an actual face to face conversation with someone who cares.