When Columbine Was Just a Flower

I went to a public school near Denver (pre-Columbine). School then felt more like home than home, and the real tests were never on paper. We were Rocky Mountain grown and no one gave a what we did at school as long as we showed up and did our best. Sometimes friendships didn’t make it out of first period but our sandwiches were always split 3 ways by lunch. In the off case it wasn’t, we handled it beyond the track field next to the pop machine, two fists and a bloody nose, or a handful of tangled apple-scented hair. We were never confused about how to settle disputes. Now they’re all anxiety riddled and scared wondering if their pop machine runs semi-automatic.