Celebratory Gunfire "A Silent Pestilence"

When we hear of children losing their lives at the hand of gunfire, it breaks our heart. Knowing that this activity can be incredibly intrusive and without prejudice, it is extremely shocking.

From The Editor's Desk

NYE 2013: Celebrate by Raising a Glass, Not a Gun

New Year's Eve brings out an odd Southern tradition: Celebratory gunfire.

At first I thought I was dreaming. But drip, drip, drip of rainwater hit my forehead with enough regularity to wake me up from my sleep. So I stared at the ceiling, grumbled, got the bucket and pushed the bed out of the way. The roofer who came to fix the leak a few days later put a small piece of metal in my hand that he extracted from the roof and explained it was the genesis of what had become a fairly sizable hole. "What is it," I asked him. "It's a bullet," he answered with a look that suggested he thought I was some sort of bumpkin for not knowing. "Well, how did it get up there," I asked. "New Year's probably. People shoot their guns for New Year's Eve to ring in the new year." Funny, up until then, I only saw people in the Middle …

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