Decade

Ten years ago tonight I was sitting in my dining room with Ken and April, Nikki and Ashley, our two Golden Retrievers, curled at our feet under our big oak table, while Winnie and Pip cuddled on the soft downy top of their tall kitty condo, half dreaming, half awake at the sounds of our laughter mixed with talk of the plans we were making. Our bags were packed and sitting near the door, two Frontier Airline tickets resting atop them. We'd eaten dinner and were discussing the early morning drive to Midway, the things April needed to do to tend to the animals, my anxiety over the entire trip. There had even been a great amount of talk about the shootings at Columbine High School in Littleton which had taken place earlier that day. At some point I stepped outside to let The Girls out, stood in the newly greening and damp grass in our backyard and smoked a cigarette while watching the stars move slowly across the sky. I could hear the soundtrack to Evita playing from inside while Ken and April did the dishes, the gentle chink of the tags on The Girls collars as they sniffed out the yard. I remember feeling like my life was on the cusp of a dramatic change and not liking it one bit. I have never been good at such things and despite my dislike for my job at CDW and the monotony of life in quiet, remote Round Lake Beach, there was comfort in its predictability, safety in routine.


Duncan and I walked the park today and only barely managed to safely navigate the flood of news vans and media which had gathered to mark the 10th anniversary of the shootings which took place at the high school across the street. It was not a pleasant walk, surrounded by sad faces and heavy hearts huddled together under the same blue sky that rose overhead ten years ago. Duncan was anxious and we didn't actually find peace in our walk until much later, when I took him out after dinner under a clear, darkened sky, the stars shining down as a warm April breeze carried the scent of the lake to us. It was the same sky I saw all those years ago in Illinois with the same constellations, only very little of that life remains. April has married and had children and we are no longer in contact, despite an immaculate and untouchable friendship. Nikki and Ashley have crossed the Rainbow Bridge and Winnie and Pip, while still full of vim and vigor, are nearly thirteen and spend far more time napping in the sunlit windows than they do chasing each other. Even Ken, who I always counted on as my constant, the one person who would always stand at my side, isn't here. I don't even own the same clothes I packed and carried across the country. It's all I can do to remember this new address.

But at least I have Duncan and our walks and the stars. On nights like tonight, when my heart feels like it's breaking, there is tremendous comfort to be found in those simple things.

Invasion

Despite what Paul Theroux had to say about geese in a Smithsonian Magazine article last year, I still loathe them.

It's that time of year when the dirty monsters make their rounds through Denver's numerous grassy areas and lakes. They descend from above in clacking clouds, defiling the land with their dark green turds and hacking, barking calls. There is nary a place I can walk without having to dodge the messy, moist piles they leave behind. The lake and swimming pools at The Breakers were infested with the things, as are the grounds of the school, the sidewalks near my home and every place in between. While working at CDW in Illinois I witnessed a goose savage a pregnant woman and nearly had to run over it with my car to drive it away from her. Geese are no friends to civilized people and I am no friend of them. Before we moved to Littleton, I delighted in freeing Duncan from his lead to let him chase the things off my lawn, barking at them as they rose skyward in a huffing impossible sweep of wings and fat bodies.

Over the weekend on one of our walks I noticed a strange footprint, a singular thing caught in a small clump of snow between two patches of grass. It was a three-toed impression within a pentagonal imprint and upon first seeing it I thought someone was having a joke at my expense. After all, I've spent enough time creating what I call "elf prints" in the snow using the side of my loosely closed fist and thumb to create a footprint which looks as thought a small, barefoot child has darted across the snow. I was reminded of E.T.s tracks in the dirt outside Elliot's house but upon leaning down and looking at it more closely quickly determined that Clement Park had not been invaded by botanist aliens but by geese. Over the next few days the tracks grew in number until this evening when we were walking down below the skate park and found ourselves in a field overrun with tracks and round little impressions where the things huddled out the night. The snow had turned gray and brown and nearly scraped away by the thousands of tracks which spread out in all directions. Duncan seemed to have discovered it before I did and so I spent much of the remainder of our walk fighting to keep him from behaving like a kid in a candy shop. Everywhere he turned he spied green chunks, ripe and juicy, perfect for sucking down like pasta.

They have invaded again and the park and my boots no longer feel safe. Duncan, on the other hand, will have something new to obsess with, now that the rabbits have become scarce.

Photo courtesy of FotoSearch

Company

This weekend Duncan's Aunt Traci is coming from Chicago for a quick visit. Traci and I met while working at CDW eight years ago and have been friends since. She's a fun person to be around and greatly different from the conservative, very Republican person I first met; now after 8 long years of beating the truth into her, I can actually tolerate being in the same room with her. Traci has made some remarkable changes in her life, all of which were witnessed by her own faithful, four-legged friends, Chloe and Murphy, both of whom are Beagles. If I didn't believe Murphy was Satan's dog, I might give them props for helping turn her into a real, live person. Instead, I'll just have to share the credit with Chloe.

It was because of Traci's arrival tonight (and my compulsive need to clean and clean again before I have guests–thanks, mom– that Duncan got a very short walk this afternoon, a quick whisk around the park and home again, home again, jiggity jig. But Traci suggested we take him for "a hike" tomorrow, which we might just do. It all depends of whether November wants to behave as though it's still October, or if it wants to pull what it pulled today by acting exactly like November.

Either way I doubt Duncan will care.

Columbine

Sometimes you wonder where you'll find inspiration–your art or your story–and you're so busy looking for it that you're surprised when it finds you. That's the way I felt this afternoon in Clement Park as Duncan and I passed through the baseball quad and worked our way up the walk toward Rebel Hill. I was surprised to discover a fleet of news crews in vans and trucks and even one or two helicopters hovering overhead. I hardly noticed that the memorial was finally open.

My Columbine story, as insignificant as it really is, began on that morning in April in 1999 while I was sitting at my desk at CDW. Ken and I were leaving for Denver the next morning and while I was killing time between editing a couple of magazine ads, I went online and saw the report on Yahoo News. Something terrible had happened in Littleton. The magnitude of the horror was something I still can't comprehend, but I remember thinking, "On choir tour in 1989 I sang at that school. I stood right there."

The next morning, after checking into our room at the downtown Denver Holiday Inn, we walked the 16th Street Mall and saw for ourselves the impact Columbine had on this community. An enormous card, the length of a city block, had been set up and people were standing, three and four deep, waiting to sign it, their hands trembling, tears in their eyes and on their cheeks. Everywhere we looked we saw the same dazed expressions; no one could believe it happened here.

Needless to say, it was a terrible time to visit Denver. We could not have picked a less enjoyable weekend to check out our new home. There was no escaping it, not in the restaurants over lunch, not in the bars and clubs, or at the zoo, not in our hotel room. Even on our way out of town we passed Al Gore's motorcade leaving the airport as it made its way toward Littleton. It wasn't until we were home that we felt relieved of the weight of the tragedy.

Shortly afterward I was speaking to my father on the phone, explaining that I'd just returned from Denver and that I was considering moving there.

"Whew, Denver," he sighed, in that radio announcer's sigh of his. "That must've been tough, and not very fun I bet."

I thought for a moment, as I often do when speaking to my father. "You know, it was an incredible experience," I began. "It was horrible and you're right, it wasn't any fun, the whole city was grieving, but I got to see that. I got to see that community pull together, was able to witness the grief and the comfort they imparted on one another and it was an amazing thing to be a part of."

Our strengths and virtues are not tested in times of peace and silence; they are tested by crisis and cacophony and Denver and Littleton passed that test. This city certainly doesn't want to be remembered because of Columbine, but it doesn't want the rest of the world to forget either. If it can happen here–in this middle-class Mormon community–it can happen anywhere.

That April day as I read about the shootings I had no idea that I'd soon live half a block away from the school, which Duncan and I occasionally walk around. It's always held this strange awe for me because something so terrible happened there and yet it looks like any ordinary school. The kids I see arriving in the morning look like any regular high school kids. Passing the front doors and moving around toward the library side, where most of the true horrors occurred, has always made me catch my breath.



This afternoon as Duncan and I entered the memorial, which won't look truly beautiful until the spring when the grass and the flowers come in, I experienced a new feeling. All around me were the actual families and friends of victims, I was surrounded by students who'd had to run for their lives. As I walked around the wall and read some of the selected quotes that had been mounted on plaques, I felt my awe of the building and the shootings fade, replaced by awe of the people and their ability to grieve and then find a place for their grief as they returned to their lives. It was overwhelming and as we left I couldn't help but cry. It felt good to be there and felt like this community, where so much anger is to be expected, has found a way to forgive.



"Hatred never ceases by hatred; by love alone it is healed. This is the timeless and eternal law. Forgiveness is primarily for our own sake, so that we no longer carry the burden of resentment. Our hearts are already heavy enough."
The Gatekeeper
(Columbine High School Memorial)