How Times Have Changed

My eyes are about to fall out of their sockets from a lack of sleep but I'm interested in the television report on the shooting at Araphoe High School in Centennial, Colorado. As of now two students were shot by an assailant allegedly looking for a teacher. Evidently, he wanted to off him but we now know he off'd himself.
This reminds me of a story dating back to 1986. It was a Saturday night, around eleven pm and I was sound asleep until the ringing of the telephone awakened me. There was a male on the other end and he identified himself as a student at the school in which I taught. Those were the days without caller id. He told me he was going to kill me the next Monday. I don't care for that kind of talk. Anyway, within two minutes I was sawing Z's again.
The following Monday I went to our principal, the good Fr. Van Weil, and told him about the threat.
He started laughing then walked away. Things like that didn't happen in those days but the more I thought about what had occurred it might be that I was, how can I say this, not that special as a staff member.
I'm not trying to make light of the school shootings. I'm sure we'll find out that the shooter in Centennial was a disturbed young person. Friends and acquaintances will come forward telling us how strange this person was, in and out of school. His or her parent's will feign cluelessness. Let's face facts. There are 160 million males in this country. Don't you think there are five or six of these who are in need of special, professional help? Killings of this kind are like waging war. They always were and always will be. Life goes on except now we'll have to listen to the nitwits who spew hate on shows like MSNBC.