One year not long ago, I resolved that every day I’d write down or photograph a reason to love Phoenix. Another, to quit complaining about the heat. The first worked better than the second, though after each I resolved to quit resolving.

Then I passed a display in my favorite nail salon and made one more resolution. I’m sure the sweet little rhinestone-encrusted gun pendant had been there the last several times I’d visited, which only made it worse that I didn’t notice it til the last week of December 2012, a time when images of guns (and what people can do with them) was fresh in most of our minds, post-Newtown.

It took my breath away and I stood there, purse dangling from my hand, polish wet on my toes, wondering, “Who would wear that? Why celebrate something that can kill people?”

I have never felt comfortable in the presence of any type of gun, never held a real one in my hand, and have written about gun violence and related topics, most recently after the Tucson shooting.

See also: My Isolated Opinion

But it took Newtown, for some reason, to shake some sense into me when it came to the gun imagery that, it turns out, is everywhere.

I started an Instagram account January 1, devoted to sharing an image each day (or close) of some sort of gun depiction. I had trouble naming the project, as @gunshow, @gunshow2013, and just about every version of a name involving “gun” were already taken. So @2013gunshow it was — clunky but it worked. I had no trouble finding images, suddenly I saw them everywhere and friends on social media sent me even more.

By July, I was done. I couldn’t look at another onesie with a rifle, another bumper sticker, another embroidered pillow. I’d posted more than 100 images. Point made.

But — point taken? Not really. Beyond posting about it on Facebook I never tried to promote the Instagram account, and in the end I think I had a measly 50 followers. People who like guns didn’t want my disdain shoved in their faces; the rest didn’t want to look at a picture of a kid with a gun popsicle in his mouth.

It’s like abortion (no matter what your position on it is):  You’re just not going to convince anyone with an image. Maybe with an event, more likely with a personal one.

In the end, several states (not my home state, of course) managed to pass gun control in the past year. Not the federal government, though. The biggest impact of Newtown, best I can tell, is that it sent gun sales through the roof nationwide.

As for me, I’m done collecting images, so please (while I appreciated it over the last few months!) stop sending them. I’m taking a break from this kind of resolution for 2013 and after that, maybe I’ll collect images of daisies. Or poodles.

Naming it was hard. There were so many choices. My first thought was “Guns as Roses,” or “Guns ‘n Poses,” then “Pistol Whipped.” “Project Gunway.” “Put a Gun on It.” In the end, it was “Gun Show.”

“Gun Show” was taken on Instagram (why was I surprised?) so after some trial and error, it’s “2013 Gun Show.” Which is fitting, since I started last week, on New Year’s Day. Really, it started a few days before that. I was leaving my favorite nail salon — a sweet little spot in a nice part of town, not one of those cheapie walk-in places but not as expensive as a full-on spa, with sparkly tiles, complimentary iced tea and classic movies playing on a loop — when I noticed it on a display by the door: a tiny, rhinestone-encrusted gun pendant, hanging below a necklace that spelled out LOVE.

I felt myself flinch.

If it had been there on my previous visits, I hadn’t noticed it — and I know why. Newtown was a tipping point, even for a gun loather like me. That’s not fair. Today is the second anniversary of the Tucson shooting — which literally hit close to home — and I ask myself, “Why didn’t I notice things like rhinestone-encrusted gun pendants after that?” I don’t know why. I didn’t. I should have. We all should have — as it turns out, Newtown seems to have been a tipping point for a lot of people.

Let’s hope so, anyway. Before Newtown I didn’t notice things like rhinestone-encrusted gun pendants, but now I do. And so I decided to embark on a little project for 2013: Gun Show. Almost immediately, someone sent me the URL to a tumblr site devoted entirely to photographs of “cute guns” — pink revolvers, pink and black camouflaged rifles. You know, cute guns. That’s not quite what I’m going for here. Look, I get that a lot of people out there want to hold onto the right to bear arms — no matter how I feel about it. I get it. (I don’t like it, I want to change it, but I get it.)

But what does it say about this country that so many people in it choose to accessorize with guns? Owls, peace signs, mustaches, bicycles, hedgehogs — all cool, fun expressions of one’s personality and preferences. Guns? Not for me. And I have to ask, why for you? I can understand sleeping with a gun under your pillow. But sleeping with your head on a pink pillow with a gun embroidered on it? Yep, you can get one on Etsy.

WHY?

When it comes to safety, I suppose it’s safer to sleep with the embroidered version. But that’s not the point. I don’t feel safe in a world that tosses deadly weaponry around with such abandon, literal or figurative. I hate that I’m so numb to it that it took me so long to realize it was all over. After the nail salon I spent some time looking for other examples and quickly came up with way more than I expected — possibly enough to fill every day of an entire year, though I don’t intend to force myself to do this every day. Most days.

A week in, it’s already working — making me more aware of what we fetishize in this society, what we put on a pedestal. Or hang from our ears.

Self righteous and preachy? Totally. But hey, it’s a free country. You have the right to bear arms, both rhinestoned and otherwise. And I have the right to tell you what I think of it.

If you’re on Instagram and you want to see the project, follow @2013gunshow. And I’d love to see any examples you find. Trust me — you’ll find them, whether you want to or not.