Here!
Everything else that was going to happen the week of April 16th, 2007 took a back seat…
...to the tragic events at Virginia Tech when a truly sick person decided to indiscriminately kill his fellow students before taking his own life. America mourns this tragic moment in our history. America mourns for the young women and men whose lives were ended so abruptly and for their parents and family who must somehow face this unspeakable sorrow.
As a parent of young children, I struggle to even think about this kind of tragedy. The birth of my two children obliterated my tolerance for stories about children of any age being killed, abused or abandoned. And so, this horrific killing deeply saddens my soul.
But America did not stop when the killer unleashed his sorrow. There is no diminishing the loss of life, the sorrow, grief and emptiness that is so real and vivid. For those directly affected by the tragedy the pain may diminish someday but it will never truly be gone. Yet, America did not stop. Life did not stop. Everything else that happened that week took a back seat to those events, but things did happen. The rest of the week happened. Sad things happened. Happy things happened.
For me, that very day will always be remembered for one of the most beautiful moments I have ever witnessed. That evening, as my wife and I were preparing the kids for bed, smothering them with kisses and silently thanking God that they were safe and sound in our home, one of those moments you wait your whole life to experience happened. Our son took his first steps. Three quick, tiny little steps that covered no more than a foot of total distance, traveled with his arms flailing out for balance, his eyes opened wide in surprise and his mouth a giant grin of success. Three steps and he fell into my arms for another round of kisses and congratulatory exclamations worthy of a Nobel prize.
Moments later, he did it again only this time he fell into my wife’s waiting arms instead of mine. The day was thus sealed as one of the handful of “best days you can imagine” and I spent the rest of the week telling all of my friends and co-workers about my son’s triumph as if he had in fact done something unique and worthy of a Nobel prize. Of course, your babies first steps are important and should be lauded as such even if your non-parent friends are annoyed or bored by the topic.
I’m not sure if it is fair or right that a week filled with so much tragedy for others could be so joyous for myself. But I do know that is the way life tends to be. The world marches on, despite all of the terrible things we experience and do to each other on a day-to-day basis. In the midst of unspeakable darkness for some, bright shining moments happen for others.
At the end of the very same week, my wife and I attended a wedding for one of her friends from law school. It was a beautiful affair held in an impressive church. I was touched by the music of the pipe organ, the bride and groom’s uncontained smiles and the charming sound of church bells sounding off as guests spilled out of the church and headed to the reception.
The reception took place in a dining area 69 floors above the city of Dallas. With the city lights shining at our feet we dined and enjoyed the happy moment with the wedding couple’s family and friends. The bride was a site to see. Beautiful and glowing with almost uncontainable joy and confidence she was a delight to watch as she made her way through the party, greeting guests and performing the traditional duties of first dances, toasts, cake cutting and assorted scheduled mini-events.
The bride, like myself, is a graduate of Texas A&M University. I don’t know her nearly as well as my wife knows her, but most Aggies seem to think we are all bonded together in some way. And so as I enjoyed the reception and watched the bride and groom experience one of the most beautiful and memorable days of their respective lives, I was reminded of the fact that the very same night was the annual Texas A&M tradition called Aggie Muster. Once a year in College Station, Texas and in meeting halls and rooms all across the world, Aggies gather to remember Texas A&M students and former students who have died in the past year.
I haven’t attended Muster in a while but it remains to me as one of the two most significant traditions of Texas A&M. I hold dear the memory of one particular Aggie Muster that I attended on campus when I was still a student. A friend from my freshman year, Juan, had passed away the previous summer. My connection to him had been distant and so I didn’t know any of his friends. But he had been, for a short time, a good friend to me. It was the type of friendship that is so common when you attend college at a large school. You meet somebody due to happenstance and for a semester or two they are an important friend in your life. And then schedules change, somebody moves to another dorm or off-campus, degrees are switched and you stop crossing paths. Your core friendships survive those changes. But a lot of friendships in college are built on happenstance. Good people just come and go. It is part of living on a campus with fifty thousand other students.
I attended Muster that year alone. None of my current friends had known Juan and I didn’t know his other friends. It was important to me to be there. I’m not sure non-Aggies can understand the emotional power of Muster. Candles are lit to remember those who have passed. And then readers begin to call out the names of Aggies who have passed in the last year. The names are read in order of class year, starting with the most recent, going back to graduating class after graduating class. On campus, the class celebrating their 50th anniversary is honored and the surviving members are in attendance. In my time at A&M, this meant classes from the early 40’s. The World War II generation. A hallowed group in America. You feel the power in the room from beginning to end.
As each name is read, anyone in attendance who was a friend or family member calls out “Here!” in remembrance of their life and spirit. I’m sure you can read more eloquent and precise descriptions of this tradition, its history and significance in other places. But I can tell you that day I learned that until you’ve called “Here!” for a fellow Aggie, you’ve never fully experienced the power of Aggie Muster.
When Juan’s name was called, somehow I managed to not choke up. I managed to call out “Here!” I’m not exactly sure how loud I said it. Maybe I screamed it out. It may have only been loud enough for the people sitting next to me to hear. Former U.S. President George H. Bush was in attendance that day and I’d like to believe he could hear me all the way across the arena.
I’m always sad when I think of Juan. He was brilliant and charming. He was studying for an engineering degree. He had graduated high school in just three years and seemed to be on his way for great things. Women loved him, or at least they did based on the stories he told which was good enough for us to be jealous of him. It just seemed so unfair that he never got the chance to finish his degree and make his mark on the world.
But as I called out “Here!” on his behalf, I knew that he had in fact made his mark on the world. He had been a friend to me and I was still here to carry on and to keep a small bit of him with me always. Yet, calling out on his behalf, I did not erase his family’s pain. That is a personal burden that no human can remove from a parent and I pray that God has since given his family some peace. Aggie Muster is a time of healing and remembrance. A time for the body of Aggies as a whole to administer to itself. It is a time of group healing and celebration of the individuals that empower the whole.
And so, all these years later, I find myself on the day of Aggie Muster at a wedding of another Aggie. The party is picking up. The happy couple has been united before God. I’m tired and it is time for us to go home and check on our babies. That same night, in those meeting halls all over the world, Aggies have gathered and called out “Here!” for those who have recently passed.
This eventful week is over at last. My son has learned to walk. My daughter has learned to give the sweetest kisses on my forehead.
The week began. The week ended. Lives were forever changed. But lives continue. America continues. The world continues.
And for those innocent souls that were taken from us we call out… Here!