I can't post anything profound nor considered about what happened today in Blacksburg. This is what I said at Historical Fiction Online (where someone thought the big deal had something to do with "being in a certain radius of DC).
I heard about it within half an hour of the second murder, and damn near didn't make it through the rest of the day. There is *nobody* around here who doesn't have blood tied to Tech. My parents' first home was on campus; my brother born while they lived there. My dad's orange and maroon graduation stole is upstairs right now; I've had it since his death, and any of this would break his heart.
The massacre was unspeakable. I still remember the Queen of England meeting the families, here in Richmond. It is manifest here EVERY day - ribbon magnets on cars. People have hardly forgotten.
When my coworker told me, I almost broke down in tears. When my boss (not local, but he was in town today) mentioned it casually, I had a hard time responding to him without my voice cracking. I have prayed ... all afternoon.
This is worse than simply appalling. It goes below an emotional, social waterline and cracks something fundamental.
***
Blacksburg is really nowhere near DC. Today's crimes began with a murder in the parking lot at the University Colosseum, and escalated when, during a routine traffic stop just afterward, the murderer then shot the campus police officer who pulled him over.
Thirty two people died less than five years ago. Too many of those people were *kids*. None of those people, nor their families, could ever have imagined this tragedy.
This happened on campus, involving a campus police officer - in all probability, a man who himself would have been mobilized to the massacre of April 16. That's all it has to have to do with this. It is devastating.
I don't mean to sound pedantic nor nasty. But this has nothing to do with Washington, DC.
3 comments:
I agree that it's bizarre to see reporters or commentators suggest that Blacksburg is in the orbit of D.C. It's more than 250 miles away! New York City is closer to Washington than Blacksburg is. Even Richmond, which is 150 miles closer, can't be called "the D.C. area."
I should clarify: the person making this comment was not a reporter, but a a member at the HFO fora posting a personal opinion.
Okay, then that's perhaps a little worse, because someone not under deadline or speaking extemporaneously on radio or TV could have spent, as I did, three minutes on Google Maps looking up relative distances. :)
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