I received three rather disturbing phone calls this morning. The first came at 8 a.m., just after Henry and Tim left for preschool and work. The moment I heard the computerized, automated voice I knew it couldn't be anything good. It was a "HAWK Alert" call, from the University, warning that an "active shooter" was in the immediate area, gave the description of the white male in his 40s and his Toyota minivan and license plate info, and told us to call "nine-hundred-eleven" (computers still aren't very smart, are they) from a safe distance if we saw him.
So I'm thinking, Oh my god, my husband and kid are out on the road, going right into what sounds like the thick of the action. I was picturing a lunatic with an Uzi, leaning out his van, mowing people down on street corners.
I flipped the TV channels and radio stations. And NO ONE had any news whatsoever. I called Tim. Who hadn't heard anything either.
Less than an hour later, though, my mom called to ask if we were OK. How'd she know, being several states away, for pete's sake?
CNN.
A second "HAWK Alert" came soon after, indicating that there was no immediate threat. Which didn't exactly calm my fears, given that our quiet little town was now plastered all over the cable news, live and somewhat-literally breaking.
By 11, the details had worked themselves out a bit. The suspect the cops were pursuing turned out to be a local guy who'd become the punch line to any of a number of bad jokes lately after he was indicted on embezzlement and money laundering charges for stealing more than a half million dollars from the bank where he worked. All, allegedly, to pay for his persistent cocaine habit.
From what we've heard, it seems that he somehow killed his four kids and his wife, then took off in his minivan and slammed it into a bridge, where it burnt up with him inside.
The HAWK Alert has been canceled, as has the lockdown of our local schools. The police are now saying they're not even sure whether the guy had a gun at all. For those conspiracy theorists out there, I'm sure the local bloggers will suggest that the wife and kids were killed by one of the guy's drug dealing contacts or that it wasn't actually his body in the burned-out van. More than a few people out there are harshly critiquing the University's alert system, which was created following the Virginia Tech massacre but until today had only issued notices of canceled classes due to inclement weather.
For complete details, visit here or here, or, if you aren't that concerned with facts and responsible journalism, you could go here.
At the end of the day, I'm pretty unaffected, from the standpoint that my husband and son are safe and sound, no one I know is looking at a prison term for nefarious activities, and tomorrow's our eighth wedding anniversary.
However, I can't get rid of this unsettled, jittery, and for lack of a better word, oogey feeling. Four innocent kids and their mama were murdered. In my town. About 10 minutes away. A news story by the local paper notes that the whole family attended church yesterday for Easter and that the youngest was preparing to take First Communion. The family name is a prominent one in town. The local radio station's morning show personalities were audibly disturbed, having trouble reporting the story this morning because their good friends, fellow football-tailgaters and big advertisers, owners of a popular flower shop, were relatives of the dead.
Yet again, we look back on a heartbreaking tragedy and try to figure out why. Once more, we're thankful that it didn't touch us more personally.
But it could always be us, or someone we know and love, next time.
You never know what to expect when the phone rings.
So I'm thinking, Oh my god, my husband and kid are out on the road, going right into what sounds like the thick of the action. I was picturing a lunatic with an Uzi, leaning out his van, mowing people down on street corners.
I flipped the TV channels and radio stations. And NO ONE had any news whatsoever. I called Tim. Who hadn't heard anything either.
Less than an hour later, though, my mom called to ask if we were OK. How'd she know, being several states away, for pete's sake?
CNN.
A second "HAWK Alert" came soon after, indicating that there was no immediate threat. Which didn't exactly calm my fears, given that our quiet little town was now plastered all over the cable news, live and somewhat-literally breaking.
By 11, the details had worked themselves out a bit. The suspect the cops were pursuing turned out to be a local guy who'd become the punch line to any of a number of bad jokes lately after he was indicted on embezzlement and money laundering charges for stealing more than a half million dollars from the bank where he worked. All, allegedly, to pay for his persistent cocaine habit.
From what we've heard, it seems that he somehow killed his four kids and his wife, then took off in his minivan and slammed it into a bridge, where it burnt up with him inside.
The HAWK Alert has been canceled, as has the lockdown of our local schools. The police are now saying they're not even sure whether the guy had a gun at all. For those conspiracy theorists out there, I'm sure the local bloggers will suggest that the wife and kids were killed by one of the guy's drug dealing contacts or that it wasn't actually his body in the burned-out van. More than a few people out there are harshly critiquing the University's alert system, which was created following the Virginia Tech massacre but until today had only issued notices of canceled classes due to inclement weather.
For complete details, visit here or here, or, if you aren't that concerned with facts and responsible journalism, you could go here.
At the end of the day, I'm pretty unaffected, from the standpoint that my husband and son are safe and sound, no one I know is looking at a prison term for nefarious activities, and tomorrow's our eighth wedding anniversary.
However, I can't get rid of this unsettled, jittery, and for lack of a better word, oogey feeling. Four innocent kids and their mama were murdered. In my town. About 10 minutes away. A news story by the local paper notes that the whole family attended church yesterday for Easter and that the youngest was preparing to take First Communion. The family name is a prominent one in town. The local radio station's morning show personalities were audibly disturbed, having trouble reporting the story this morning because their good friends, fellow football-tailgaters and big advertisers, owners of a popular flower shop, were relatives of the dead.
Yet again, we look back on a heartbreaking tragedy and try to figure out why. Once more, we're thankful that it didn't touch us more personally.
But it could always be us, or someone we know and love, next time.
You never know what to expect when the phone rings.
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