Today a science teacher in an Indiana middle school averted a potential mass shooting situation when a 7th grader came back to class with two handguns. Apparently he nailed the kid in the head with a basketball, then tackled him. The teacher was shot three times, but appears to be in good condition. I haven’t heard the condition of the girl who was shot.

Lots of people are hailing him as a hero and he is. When I think about the possibility of a situation like that, I like to think I would have the presence of mind to throw things and try to incapacitate the aggressor. It feels like enough of a threat that I’ve run through it in my head. I’m not sure what I would do, though.

Here’s the thing: it’s a terror for any of us teachers to have to really think about this. I want to think I would fight, but another part of me really doesn’t want to have to fight. I didn’t sign up to be a human shield; I didn’t go to school for physical protection and bodyguard work. I love my students, sure, but I also love my family and my own children. Why should I even have to think about a situation where I might have to sacrifice my own life, sacrifice getting to be there for my own kids? I know it’s still extremely unlikely, but it’s become bad enough that we drill for it, we almost expect it, and every damn time something like this happens, we think about what we would have done, how we would have helped, how we could have barricaded our doors or run for the nearest exit, hoping there wasn’t a bullet waiting behind it.

I learned that Steam, a gaming platform online that people in my house play on, has a game called “Active Shooter”, a first-person shooter game where the player is the school shooter. I haven’t seen real evidence that video games actually directly cause violence, but holy shit, that’s a little over the line. A lot over the line. I am waiting and hoping the pull it off the platform, not sure what to do if they don’t respond to criticism (feel free to call Steam, and their parent company Valve, out wherever you can on this).

Finally, I saw that some Rambo-wannabe parents are showing up to schools on lockdowns with their AR-15s and other weapons. What in the actual fuck are they thinking? That they are going to beat the police there and storm the school with no training and no clue what they are walking into? So many lockdowns are based on potential or perceived threats, too – I’ve been in real lockdowns numerous times at this point in my career. None had active shooter components, thank God. They were scary enough not knowing what was happening, if there actually was an incident in another part of the school or what. So are these superhero gun parents going to just go up to/into a school with a perceived threat, only to confuse and scare real first responders?

Finally, how is a 7th grader getting his hands on two handguns and sneaking (?) them to school? The guy in Santa Fe a week ago was 17; Parkland’s shooter was 19. Older teens have more autonomy and ways to do things without detection; the guy in Florida bought his own AR. This kid was apparently 13 (if he was an average 7th grader). How does that kid get two handguns to bring to school?

Damn, America. We are failing.