I can't believe it has happened again. Another shooting rampage. As I heard the news, my jaw dropped, my heart sank and tears welled in my eyes. How many have to die like this, in our civilized democracy, before we decide we have had enough?

I have wanted to write about this for many years, but the shooting at Northern Illinois University struck very close to home.

I am tired of the arguments, neatly and tightly worded and provided by the National Rifle Association. You know, "Guns don't kill -- people do" or "We have the right to bear arms" or "It was our forefathers' plan for our citizens to be able to arm themselves."

Blah, blah, blah.

It is an election year. Why doesn't either side ever want to bring the issue of guns in our society to the table? I mean, really bring it to the table, not just package it up, shrug our shoulders and turn to other issues. Gun "control" as we have now means there is no control at all. Our country is out of control, and I am afraid we are all becoming numb to it.

I am numb no more. I want our children to be able to sit in a lecture hall, to walk down a street, to wait for a bus and not have to wonder when will it happen to them.

I sat in Cole Hall for various classes between 1986 and 1991 with hundreds of others taking classes as I earned my degree.

I was a campus tour guide who talked about the very buildings and grounds that I saw Thursday night on television.

I took my young children around the campus for a little tour of "Mom's college" just last year on a visit to Illinois.

I am a graduate of Northern Illinois University. A school that once sat in the cornfields of DeKalb, Ill. A school very few of my friends in Minnesota had ever even heard of, until late Thursday afternoon.

KIM VAN ZANDT-AUNE, ST. LOUIS PARK; NORTHERN ILLINOIS UNIVERSITY CLASS OF 1991