Tragedy, Memory

I will never forget where I was on 9/11. Mr. Carter's 7th grade Earth Science classroom. He received a typed note from a hall monitor.

4/16.  Mrs. Lebherz's Honors Government class. The death toll climbed until track practice that afternoon.

12/14.  The parking lot of a McDonald's. Megan read from her phone, "Did you hear about the shooting?" We immediately stopped talking and went to online news sites.

Tragedy makes a profound impact on memory.

Personal tragedy and memory: Dropping Brad off at the airport before Afghanistan. Saying "see you soon" three different times. Waiting for the phone to ring. Crying myself to sleep not knowing if he was safe. Checking the KIA list multiple times a day, sometimes multiple times an hour.

The "Uncle Jack has died" phone call. Sobbing in Brad's arms. Delivering Aunt Sandy's and Jamie's eulogies. Practicing those eulogies in Uncle Jack's chair the night before. Watching my family mourn a husband/father/friend in the hearse. Hearing their sobs through the heavy black doors.

Family friend's deaths--Bob Evans, Melissa, Tammy, Mr. C., Jan. The blow I got when I found out Jan tried to kill herself before.

The suicides in 10th grade. Watching people sit in the hallways and cry. Skipping history lessons to talk about life in Mr. Lemoncelli's American History II classroom.

And public tragedy and memory: Columbine. Aurora. Oklahoma City. Arizona. 9/11. Newtown, Connecticut, which are all tragedies that are so much more personal to others than they are to me.

Tragedy triggers memory and vice versa. You remember the time, the place, the smells, the clothes, the feeling, the moment, the fear, the sadness, the shock, the worry. It's like a freeze frame in the archive of your memory, the movie that shapes your life. A moment that you can rewind to anyone says something, does something, hints at something that triggers that mechanism in your brain that says, "This reminds me of that."

Several years from now, I won't forget that on 12/14 I was wearing a bright yellow shirt and a flower-print scarf, ripped jeans, and brown boots that dug into my heels. I won't forget that I was in a McDonald's parking lot across from Dorney Park.

I will always remember that I had a glass of water that tasted like Orange Lavaburst. That I ate a mushroom and swiss snack wrap and 4 McNuggets while watching CBS News coverage.

I will always remember that I felt guilty for going to New York City for the weekend and didn't want to post pictures of the drive in on Facebook. That I could hear Obama crying during his address, which we found on an AM radio station outside of the city.

I will remember the overwhelming sense of grief I felt when I thought about such a tragedy so close to Christmas and Hanukkah and Kwanzaa.

20 sets of young parents will have to figure out what to do with the presents they may have already wrapped. The presents that may already be under the tree: football jerseys, Barbie dolls, puzzles, games. These are presents that they will never have the joy of watching their child open because one man with a gun and who-knows-what-hell kind of motive wielded multiple weapons in a "safe place," a school. A school with bulletin boards about the ABCs and playgrounds with tiny little swings and cubby holes to hold tiny little jackets and cartoon-character lunch pails.

My heart bleeds for the victims' families. My heart bleeds that many of these children may still have believed in Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, and the Easter Bunny. That they went to bed with bedtime stories and nightlights to scare away the monsters.

Aurora. Columbine. Arizona. Virginia Tech. Newtown. A deep sense of grief is now forever associated with those words because of a man, a monster. These mentally-unstable people devastated countless families because.

Because is the answer because we will never know their motives. And what motives we may learn we will never understand.

It is not about God. He or She may not exist. This tragedy is not about lack of God in schools. Not every child in the classroom believes in God or believes in the same God. This is about the twenty-six people who lost their lives on December 14th and the twenty-six families that were impacted by that loss.

It is not about the shooter. I am sorry. He is not the victim here. The Adam Lanzas of the world will continue to choose homocide before suicide unless a profound change occurs in our society. I have hope that my generation will have the answer.