Okay, so last night Jaci called me, and told me some people on Discord were rather concerned about me, since I hadn't been on in a while, nor had a posted a blog here.

I told her and the others I had gotten super focused on a stupid D&D thing I had been working on, and just kind of tuned everything else out.

But having had a night to think about it, that was only partially true.

See, last Thursday, a 16 year old boy killed 2 police officers, seriously wounded his own mother, and then took his own life here in Edmonton.

At the time, I just joined the rest of the city in feeling shock and grief, or at least that's what I was telling myself.

Until Saturday, when Mike and Carol came over, and while trying to make my mother understand what had happened, Carol pointed out the number of things I had in common with the shooter.

See. when I was 16, I was a ball of rage, grief, and confusion, without any real coping skills, and more than once I resorted to violence to try and express myself.

She pointed out I had almost killed my stepfather, almost killed myself more than once, and was really not that different than the shooter, except I had not had access to a firearm.

She's not wrong, and by saying it forced me to confront the uncomfortable truth of the similarities.

So at least part of the reason I haven't been on Discord is I think I was scared this might come out, and I wasn't ready to for that.

So my apologies to Jaci and the others on Discord, as well as anybody else who was worried.