There are just some stories that won’t leave your mind. They haunt you and follow you, creeping into your thoughts at times when you least expect.##M:[more]##
The story that won’t leave me alone is the story of Rebecca Annitto, the Stuart Country Day School sophomore who was killed in a three-car accident on Alexander Road on September 14th. She was one of five girls coming home from crew practice. The day sticks in my mind. The time sticks in my mind. I keep reconstructing the accident, thinking about all the “if onlys.”
If only those two cars had not been coming up the hill on that S-curve at the same time the car in which Rebecca was a passenger hydroplaned. If only someone had called out to the girls as they left practice that day saying you forgot your water bottle, you forgot your sweatshirt. A few extra seconds either way and their car still may have been out of control, but the deadly impact may not have happened.
As a reporter, I am always intrigued by the details of events. After all, it is the curiosity of the who, what, when, where, and why that got me into the profession of asking questions. But it is not a morbid sense of needing to know that explains why this particular story is having such staying power not only with me, but with the mothers and fathers whose paths I cross every day. It is spoken about in hushed tones on the sidelines at soccer — did you know that girl from Stuart; it is there at the scout meeting — did you hear about that accident; it is there in the circle of parents at back-to-school night — can you believe what happened.
This is a story about that one degree of separation, a story that strikes fear and pain and empathy in all of our hearts because Rebecca could be any one of our children and so, in a sense, belongs to all of us. This one also center-punched me in the gut because Rebecca is the same age as my oldest. Katie didn’t know her, but many of her friends did. Rebecca’s younger sister, Leah, is Molly’s age. Molly didn’t know either Rebecca or Leah, but being a first year student at Stuart, she is a part of the community directly in the wake of the tragedy. She came home, shaken, describing how all the Upper School girls and some of the teachers were crying.
I got the call from one of the Stuart class mothers the morning after the accident. They were calling all of us so we would get details straight from the source rather than hearing about the accident piecemeal throughout the day. After I put down the phone I put my head in my arms and sobbed, not just for Rebecca and for her family, but for everyone, our vulnerability and the fragility of life in general.
I didn’t know her parents, but my heart broke for their pain. I thought about her three younger sisters, and how life would change for them without their big sister. I had a thought that seemed relatively trivial. I hoped that none of them had picked a squabble with Rebecca that morning or the night before, as sisters sometimes tend to do. But then something like that really isn’t so trivial, is it, because you never know what your last memory of a loved one will be. It’s like the morning of 9-11 when people went to work kissing their loved ones goodbye, not realizing it would be the last time.
I think about the teenager who was driving the car, for whom life will never be quite the same. I think about the other girl who was injured and the physical and emotional healing she’s going through. I think about the other two passengers and all the thoughts that must have run through their minds, especially, what if they had been the one to take that seat in the back.
There is another point that sticks out in my mind. Just that day, that wet Wednesday morning when we were still being lashed by the outskirts of the hurricanes that did so much damage in the gulf, I had given Katie a talk about how dangerous the roads were. Since you’ll be driving in just a few short years, I had told her, take a good look at these wet roads. See how the leaves are falling where water is mixing with layers of oil. These are conditions that can be just as dangerous as ice, I had cautioned, maybe even more so, because while you expect ice to be slippery, you don’t expect wet roads and wet leaves to be so treacherous.
Over the years I’ve come up with my own way to understand terrible events like this. My theory is that God is building an alternate universe that he’s populating with the most remarkable of the remarkable. Only very special people are allowed in at a time when they are most needed, which explains why some of the best people seem to be taken all too soon.
For example, Princess Diana was needed to do good works in this parallel universe and God called her in for duty. It was her time. While John F. Kennedy Jr. wasn’t quite ready to take on a leadership role in his earthly life, in this alternate universe, there was a position waiting for him. When Buddy Holly and the Big Bopper went down in a plane crash decades ago, God needed a good rock and roll band. I’d like to think of Captain Ed States (see story, page 10) chosen to pilot God’s own version of Air Force One. We all have our own ways of accepting the unacceptable. This is mine.
In addition to volunteering at Beth Israel Hospital, Rebecca served on her school newspaper and was coxswain for the Mercer Junior Rowing Club. She had participated in the Princeton Rowing Club, which competed last year in the nationals. Perhaps God needed a coxswain for his new rowing team. When she was just a little girl, Rebecca also beat out 300 entries to win an award from NASA for the design of a patch for the Discovery Mission. It seems somehow appropriate that she won that particular honor. I’d like to think of her wearing that patch soaring out over the stars.
The Suburban Mom’s blog is at suburbanmom.typepad.com. She welcomes comments and suggestions for future column ideas.
