“Let’s Not Be Scared, Let’s Be Prepared” Written by Parker A. Poodle™ ©2019 Every dog, every child needs a trusted chum, an adviser who can teach them the pees and queues. At age 16, never did I, Parker A. Poodle a Reading Education Assistance Dog, assume a howling need to explain a despicable decade increase in gun violence. Simply stated we must acknowledge America’s gun problem and teach children the particulars of personal and public safety. Including the new vocabulary—words like shots fired, active shooter, dangerous someone; inform, counter and evacuate. “Most children play with toy guns or use their hands to pretend they are holding a gun,” Rachel Schulson’s Guns What You Should Know explains. “Have you ever wondered about real guns?…A bullet shot from a gun can travel up to 5,000 feet per second. That means that if you and a bullet had a race, the bullet would get to the end of your block before you even took your first step…It is impossible to know exactly where the bullet will end up.” According to the U.S. Gun Violence Archive from January 1, 2019, to September 20, 2019, there have been 40,596 incidents of gun violence, including 10,744 deaths (26.5%). Today a hotel (Las Vegas), shopping center (El Paso), or movie theater (Aurora); office (Annapolis, Virginia Beach), church (Charleston) or school (Columbine, Blacksburg, Newtown and Parkland) is not always a place of safety. In October MGM International Mandalay Bay paid $800 million to 4000+ victims of the Las Vegas hotel shooting. About 228,000 students have experienced a school shooting since 1999—Columbine. “Let’s not be scared, let’s be prepared!” the National Center for Youth Issues, ALICE Training Institute suggests. I sometimes worry my dog house may not be safe should a dangerous someone draw near. …