I am making the most I can out of the 10 minute break I have today. Haven't had a chance to text or chat with my homesycles the past week due to horrible signal on my cell up here in Iowa. The training is going fantastic, the little town is just beautiful beyond words...or maybe I really miss living up north. I ventured to several restaurants and the mall, got lost a few times, cursed and cried - nothing new there. Tomorrow my flight leaves in the afternoon out of a town nearby so I will wake up early and see the little sleeping town and take pictures/get some shopping done.
I normally don't check on www.endi.com that often, which is the site for the major newspaper from back home in Puerto Rico. I decided to see what was up in my little island, since I've heard the political situation is more more aggitated along with the collapse of the working class alltogether. I'm greeted by a hostage situation that lasted almost all day in a supply store, only to have SWAT find the robbers had fled leaving behind no clues. Also, a 19 yr old gay guy was stabbed, decapitated, dismembered and set on fire by a homophobe in a small town. I don't even have words for that except utter disbelief at reading something like that in this day and age. More corruption and economic crisis headlines, countless drug related murders...all the young people wasting their life pointlessly in drug wars. Protests left and right, against homophobia and the current governor with his crazy corrupt antics. Bleh.
Then I stumble upon the news of the moment, and a heart breaking one at that. Apparently 9 kids were headed to school early yesterday morning, when the school bus veered off the road and went off 50 feet down onto the highway below. Some say the driver fell asleep, other signs seem to point to him passing out do to being diabetic, while the kids and many other witnesses say he had a habit of playing 'zig zag' with the bus full of kids while driving. A game. He did it to scare them, and play with them. Whatever happened, ended up with the bus tumbling down and landing on its side...and on the 9 yr old little girl that flew out of one of the open windows. The loss of life, is always heart-breaking for someone. Even if it's your enemy, that enemy had a family or someone that at some point or another they meant the whole world to. As I countinued to read, already saddened that the poor child had such a painful, horrific death on her way to school, I came across the part that just twisted my lungs into knots. I quote:
(Via AP) The father of the girl, Felix Noel Guzman, arrived at the scene at the accident and for several minutes attempted to reach the body of his daughter, but was prevented by the authorities. Her body lay by the school bus, covered by a white blanket. After convincing the authorities, and with the aproval of the detectives on the scene, they led him to the body and uncovered it for identification - at which point he fell on his knees, gathered the body in his arms, and proceeded to kiss it all over amidst his sobs.
For his own safety, he was immediately asked to step away from the scene by the police. "She's my daughter! My life! I want to be with her until they take her away!", the man screamed drowning in his cries as he tried to stop the authorities that were trying to remove him from his daughter Paula Nicole Guzman's side. She was traveling in the bus with her four older siblings, who survived the crash and witnessed everything.
We've all, every single one of us, lost someone in death. Some in tragic manners, a few of us due to long drawn out illnesses. When my grandmother died, of cancer, I kissed her repeatedly all over. I didn't want the funeral home to take her from the house. You never forget their look. You will never forget the cries, screams. Sometimes, it was the silence and finality of it all that broke us beyond repair. He just wanted to cradle his child, kiss her and have her in his arms a few more moments until she would be gone from reach for the rest of his life. The mother couldn't even do that. She was over the side of the road with her other 4 injured children. The family, physically broken, emotionally drained.
Count your blessings, while you have them, no matter how small. It can always be worse. This made me sad. So sad. See you all tomorrow.
ugh
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