In memory of good
men, I’d like to share this with you today, because it has been over a decade
since their passing. Please take the time to read this, because it isn’t
fiction. I want you to read this only in the hopes that these men will be remembered.
They don’t deserve to be forgotten. Nor do the people that loved them—murder affects
not only the victim, but everyone who knew and loved them. Please take a moment
to see that these men were and are more than just a name and a death date in a
news report.
I glance up at the trees, my
blonde hair swinging from side to side as I chase after my sister, the tall
boughs far above my head swaying in the gentle breeze, the sun shining
brilliantly. We cut to the left, towards the cracked sidewalk and street and
away from the small cemetery that seems large to me from my small viewpoint.
Being six doesn’t give you much height from which to view the world.
We run across the street, my
sister and I, laughing, leaping over the grass and dirt of the front yard and
up the two cement steps to the white porch and screen door. We are laughing as
we pull it open, our arms laden down with carrying Kirsten and Samantha, our ever
faithful companions. The robin’s egg blue floorboards of the porch are chipping
under our feet, but we don’t even see them as we push open the heavier front
door and step into the living room with its pale green walls and wood floors
with knots and grease stains. Building toys are spread across the floor:
Lincoln Logs, Tinker Toys, wooden building blocks, Legos, most of the morning’s
creations stomped into the floor by small feet or swept aside by little hands.
No matter, they will be rebuilt, bigger and better than before.
My sister and I slip off our
shoes, still disappointed at the loss of the shiny black shoe that is absent
from Samantha’s foot, but we will have to find boots for her to wear instead.
Up the stairs with bare feet scuffing on the floor, we go, turning the corner
of the hall and into our bedroom with its ugly, pink floral wallpaper that we
no longer even see. We are hell bent on the tub that holds the doll clothes, in
desperate search of shoes for Samantha’s feet. We find them, little mauve boots
that are ugly as sin, but we think they are beautiful, and on they go, onto the
little doll feet so that Kirsten and Samantha are now wearing matching shoes.
Mommy is calling for us
downstairs, her voice echoing in the stairwell. Up we get, leaving the mess we
have made and taking our dolls as we rush down the stairs, our little feet
making a noise that could be likened to thunder.
“Get your shoes on,” she says.
“Let’s go see Daddy. We’re already five minutes late.”
We scamper to where we have left our
shoes beside the door, eager to make the short trek through the cemetery to the
campus where Daddy teaches and climb the stairs to the little, dusty attic
office where our artwork is taped to the door. Maybe we can go to the library,
and run through the empty rows, listening to the echo of our footsteps or stand
at the windows and stare at our house from stories up. Maybe. But we don’t.
Daddy comes through the door, but
my sister and I aren’t paying much attention. We look up and smile, say hello,
then focus again on putting on our shoes while the dolls sit beside us.
“There’s a gunman on campus,” I
hear Daddy say.
Mommy doesn’t believe him. “You’re
joking.” She almost laughs, but not quite. The shock keeps her from laughing.
“No, I’m not. There’s a gunman on
campus.”
I don’t exactly know what is
happening. Gunmen do not exist in my world. Or they didn’t, up until then. I
imagine an old man with silver white hair and a hunting rifle. At least, I
think I did. That’s what I imagined years later, anyway. Just then I was
staring at my shoes on my little feet, and wondering if maybe we had left
Samantha’s shoe at the neighbors’ or if it is still in the field beside the
cemetery, waiting to be found.
I watch from the porch at times,
from the screen door at other times, my hands pressed against the glass. The
big white house I call home has become a safe house to more people than just me
and my family. People come flocking over from the campus, through the cemetery,
and stand on the porch or in the living room, their faces filled with shock and
confusion.
The field that just minutes before
had been subject to a search by children for a doll’s shoe is now a parking lot
for emergency vehicles. Ambulances, police cars, fire trucks, news vehicles...
They fill the field, trampling the soft grass into the earth with wheels and
feet much bigger than my own so that it cannot spring up again and be just the
same as it was before. Off in the distance, I see a helicopter land. It comes
down slowly, touching down in another nearby field. It’s an emergency
helicopter, but I don’t care. I don’t care that it is here to airlift injured
people to the hospital because the ambulance is not fast enough. Life Flight
means nothing to me. It’s just a helicopter, and I don’t often get to watch one
land, so I cannot take my eyes from it. I can feel my sister beside me, her
eyes fixed on it as well, captivated as I am.
“Mommy! There’s a helicopter!” I
yell, and Mommy comes over and watches the helicopter for a minute, but it
isn’t as fun for her as it is for me. It means something different to Mommy.
After a while Mommy and Daddy put
on a movie and I sit between my brother and sister on the sofa, watching The
Hobbit unfold on the old TV. I’m not even distracted by the people milling
around. All I care about is the story.
“Can we check the news?” Daddy
asks nicely just as we reach the part where Smaug is lying on his bed of gold.
My siblings and I nod, knowing
that Daddy is only being polite and they are going to check the news anyway. On
the table next to the TV is a little black radio, a little dusty, and a voice
is issuing from it. I don’t pay attention to the radio, but watch as black and
gray fuzzy lines wave across the screen and obscure Smaug from view.
The gunman shot four people, all
of them monks. Friends of ours had to lock themselves in the basement and pray
that they would be safe. Of the four shot, two died. The gunman, once he had
wreaked havoc on this little world of monks and people living together in
peace, entered the church, and slipped into the back pew where my family always
sat. And shot himself.
Daddy is going to the funeral
Mass. Daddy always went to work without me, so I don’t feel left behind. But
then he comes home so that Mommy can go, too. And then I want to go. Mommy never
goes anywhere without me, and I fuss to be brought along. But the answer is no.
Mommy cries.
I watch as Mommy dresses for the
funeral. She never really wears dark colors, so she only owns a navy dress with
big white polka dots. I watch her as she stands in the yellow bedroom, slipping
into that dress, and then I watch as she walks to the full-length mirror with
its big oak frame, where it sits in a corner. She is crying. Tears are sliding
down her face, her hands pulling at the dress to straighten it. I am still
unhappy that I am not going with her, but I am sad that Mommy is crying. Mommy
does not cry. It is the first time I can ever recall seeing Mommy cry. But cry
she does as she walks out the door and across the street and through the
cemetery to the funeral, her back to me as I watch from the porch window, this
time all alone. I watch her go, and then I turn and go inside to play with my
brother and sister until Mommy returns. I don’t remember if she was crying when
she came back. I don’t remember her coming back at all. She did, but all I
remember is watching her walk away in the polka dot dress.
On Sunday, Mommy walks into the
church, beautiful and composed. Mothers are always beautiful, but not all
mothers are strong. And mine is strong. My mother is brave. She leads the way,
carrying my youngest brother, and enters the pew. The very last pew. And we
follow her, never questioning. All throughout Mass I am bored, and I stare at
the wood of the pew in front of us, wondering if there is still blood on it.
Everything had been cleaned away, but not a soul there can ignore the fact that
the peace of the little world, even in the sanctuary of the church, had not
gone unaltered.
After Mass, Father comes and
kisses Mommy’s forehead, tears in his eyes, and he thanks her for taking her
seat.
This pew is where Mommy always
sits, kneels down to say her prayers, and scolds us for misbehaving, and she
will take her seat, blood or no blood having been spilt there. That’s the kind
of strong Mommy is.
I skip home, through campus and
across the street, climbing the steps to the cemetery under the shade of the
tree, innocent and happy, flanked by my brother and sister. But only a few
steps into that blessed yard of stones, Mommy calls to us, telling us to stop
and pray. She leads us to the graves, no stones marking them, and tells us to
say a prayer for the poor souls who had died. She knows we can’t put faces to
the names, because the good men we had lost were people to us, not just the
names on the little plastic markers.
We say our prayers quickly, eager
to go home and change into clothes for play, but as my brother toddles away and
my sister hurriedly concludes her prayer, I slow down to finish mine.
Pray for us sinners,
Now and at the hour of our death...
I can smell the grass and the
fresh turned earth as I crouch next to the two fresh graves, all the colors
saturated and the breeze blowing, stirring my hair and clothes. I can’t resist,
and I reach out, almost guiltily, knowing that I should leave the grave
untouched. My small fingers touch the fresh dirt and I scoop up a small
handful, letting it trickle down through my fingers, leaving a fine dust on my
hand along with the scent of earth.
“Amen.”
I finish the prayer and stand up
quickly, dusting my hand off on my skirt, and run over the grass towards my
family, eager to catch up with my sister so I’m not alone, leaving the graves
behind me.
We never did find that shoe.
In memory of Father Philip Schuster, O.S.B.,
and Brother Damien Larson, O.S.B., gunned down in their monastery on the
morning of June 10, 2002.
