If the Oklahoma City bombing and the Columbine shootings seem like they happened just yesterday, the Ukrainian immigrant family's demise in California and the Sioux City, Iowa slayings must seem like they happened only a minute ago.
The sad fact is that before we can catch our breath from the insane violence of the day there will be a new, more horrific assault on humankind.
I wonder if we all have resigned ourselves to the fact that the random acts of violence will go on forever. There must be something we can do to stem the tide of our collective horror.
But what? I once thought that we all should celebrate a special day, say on the anniversary of the Columbine massacre or on the anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing, where we all just stay home and be with our families. If everyone stayed home we might get a respite from the shock and sorrow of yet another act of violence.
I now believe that a collective action in pursuit of kindness will probably not occur. I've decided that it's my responsibility to pit kindness against violence. No one can spread my kindness except me. And no one can spread your kindness except you.
I must take responsibility to inject kindness into the world, and I hope millions of others take responsibility to spread kindness in their spheres of influence.
Rather than approach the spread of kindness in a random fashion, I have decided to follow a course of planned acts of kindness. One or two acts of kindness just won't make that much of a difference, but I believe that the pursuit of a kindness plan will eventually overtake the force of violence.
Of course it will take the actions of millions others before we impact the intensity and frequency of the meanness in our daily lives.
I've planned the acts of kindness to perform this week. What will you do?
(Mark Brennaman is publisher of WitWords, your online source for lots of laughs. You can email him at mark@witwords.com.)