{"id":7531,"date":"2018-06-03T10:30:21","date_gmt":"2018-06-03T14:30:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/?p=7531"},"modified":"2018-06-03T10:30:21","modified_gmt":"2018-06-03T14:30:21","slug":"amanda-cook-gun-violence-cranes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/2018\/06\/03\/amanda-cook-gun-violence-cranes\/","title":{"rendered":"Trying To Imagine The Unimaginable Number Of 37,000 Americans Dead From Guns In A Year"},"content":{"rendered":"

How can we imagine the unimaginable number of people who die from guns in the United States each year? Federal statistics say the tally was 37,863 people lost in 2016, the most recent year for which federal data is available.<\/p>\n

A couple weeks back, my friend, the Gloucester poet Amanda Cook<\/a>, launched a project to fold 37,863 origami cranes. \u201cMy hope is to have them displayed by this time next year,\u201d she says. \u201cIf you were to see them all hanging together, 37,000 cranes, you can\u2019t deny. The number would be overwhelming.\u201d (Read her blog about the project: \u201cOrange Origami Cranes for National Gun Violence Awareness.\u201d<\/a>)<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I have a free moment I make them,\u201d she says. \u201cWhen I have my morning cup of coffee. When I sit down. We\u2019ve also had a few crane-making events.\u201d Between her and friends, she figures she\u2019s got at least 1,500 folded so far.<\/p>\n

\""Origami<\/a>
“Origami Crane Fold-In for Gun Violence Awareness” at Pleasant Street Tea Co. in Gloucester, May 27, 2018. (Courtesy)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Help Wonderland keep producing our great coverage of local arts, cultures and activisms (and our great festivals) by contributing to Wonderland on Patreon<\/a>. And sign up for our free, weekly newsletter<\/a> so that you don’t miss any of our reporting.<\/em><\/p>\n

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\u201cI think the conversation about gun violence goes so easily to gun control and people\u2019s right to have guns,\u201d Cook says. \u201cBy making cranes that each represents a person, it takes it back to people. We\u2019re not arguing over guns or not, we\u2019re talking about people\u2019s lives that were lost.\u201d<\/p>\n

In December 1992, a student went on a school shooting rampage at Simon\u2019s Rock in Great Barrington, Massachusetts. Among those murdered were Galen Gibson, Cook\u2019s friend, an 18-year-old student from Gloucester.<\/p>\n

\u201cTwenty-five years ago, I lost two friends to gun violence. My friend Galen was killed at Simon\u2019s Rock and a friend committed suicide,\u201d Cook says. \u201cThat changed my life. I think it showed me that there is no promise of tomorrow. We only have what we do today. You have to live right the whole time because you don\u2019t get the chance to make up. I don\u2019t mean it in a negative way. But if you think of something good you can do, you should do it.\u201d<\/p>\n

For the past few years, Cook has organized vigils and other events in Gloucester to coincide with National Gun Violence Awareness Day on June 1\u2014and this year\u2019s \u201cWear Orange Weekend,\u201d<\/a> a national campaign in which \u201cthousands of Americans will wear orange to send the powerful message that there is more we can do to end gun violence.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Amanda<\/a>
Amanda Cook’s “morning coffee cranes” from May 28, 2018. (Courtesy)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Cook says, \u201cI wanted to do something other. You make your calls. You write letters. You wear orange. But I wanted to do something constructive also.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI wanted it to be a tangible thing that you could feel. The idea was to create something.\u201d She\u2019s written<\/a>: \u201cThe crane is a symbol of peace and hope. There is a Japanese tradition of making 1,000 origami cranes which are then strung together. Some claim that anyone who folds 1000 cranes will be granted a wish. Some claim that anyone who folds 1000 cranes will get eternal good luck, happiness and freedom from illness and injury. We wish for an end to gun violence.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAlso when you make cranes it\u2019s a meditative process. When I fold them I\u2019m thinking of the people who were lost,\u201d Cook says. \u201cWith 37,000, you hear about some of the deaths, but there are so many that don\u2019t get any attention. So you fold 17 and you might think of the people in Parkland. But there\u2019s 96 people who die in a day. So you think about the other 79 people. I think about 21 to 22 veterans who kill themselves a day. Sixty-six percent do that with a gun. I think about the people I know in the military. I think about mothers who\u2019ve lost children.\u201d<\/p>\n

Recently, Cook told about a friend handing her a bag of 100 orange origami cranes. “I thought it was a lot,” the friend told her, “then I realized it wasn’t even 1 percent.”<\/p>\n

Cook notes: \u201c100 cranes is just a little more than would represent the 96 deaths each day.\u201d Then she wrote, \u201cWe sat together and folded more cranes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Previously:<\/strong>
\nDec. 12, 2015: \u2018We Can End Gun Violence\u2019 Rally at State House<\/a>
\nJune 5, 2016: Vigil for National Gun Violence Awareness Day<\/a>
\nFeb. 15, 2018: \u2018My Name Is Greg Gibson And I\u2019m Speaking With The Man Who Killed My Son\u2019<\/a>
\nMarch 15, 2018: ‘Protect Children Not Guns’\u2014Elementary School Students Protest In Cambridge<\/a>
\nMarch 24, 2018: \u2018Enough!\u2019 Photos From The March For Our Lives: Boston<\/a>
\nMarch 30, 2018: \u2018There Are Hurts That Don\u2019t Go Away\u2019\u2014Amanda Cook\u2019s Poetic Memoir Of Her Mother\u2019s Dementia, Of Becoming A Mom Herself, Of Everyday Life<\/a><\/p>\n

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Help Wonderland keep producing our great coverage of local arts, cultures and activisms (and our great festivals) by contributing to Wonderland on Patreon<\/a>. And sign up for our free, weekly newsletter<\/a> so that you don’t miss any of our reporting.<\/em><\/p>\n

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How can we imagine the unimaginable number of people who die from guns in the United States each year? Federal statistics say the tally was 37,863 people lost in 2016, the most recent year for which federal data is available. A couple weeks back, my friend, the Gloucester poet Amanda Cook, launched a project to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7534,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[106,100],"tags":[35,279],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7531"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7531"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7531\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7537,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7531\/revisions\/7537"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7534"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7531"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7531"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7531"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}