A Mother's Diary: 'Where There Is Dark, There Is Always Light'
The mother of a Virginia Tech freshman who lost two high school friends in Monday's masssacre wrote down her thoughts in the initial days following the shootings. Shari Sachs is the mother of Nicole Bonfiglio, who graduated last year from Westfield High School in Chantilly, Va., with her friends, Reema Samaha and Erin Peterson. The killer, Cho Seung- Hui, also graduated from Westfield, in 2003. Sachs went to Blacksburg to pick up her daughter on Tuesday, April 17. The two returned to their Northern Virginia home the same day. The diary excerpts are transcribed as written.
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4/17 – My daughter is but one of 25,000 students who attend Va Tech and thankfully unharmed physically by yesterday's tragic events. Nevertheless I was astounded and heart warmed at the outpouring of love and concern that I received yesterday checking to ensure she and I were okay.
I thought about how many people just I talked to, my parents and my daughter talked to. Just one student. Then thought about the tens of thousands of students families and friends all reaching out to one another with care and concern and the ripple affect of what is best about humanity that is created by senseless acts. How we grieve on so many levels–most tragically are the victims and their families. But something of this proportion creates community at so many levels–the college community; their families, the state and all across the nation. I don't know if people so filled with rage and anger realize that in their quest to harm and hurt, what they ultimately achieve is the opposite. As in 911–the ensuing aftermath brings out the best in humanity juxtaposed against the worst of it, and ultimately serves to bring us closer in our shared grief, sorrow and outrage.
Where there is dark, there is always light. The light in this horrific act is this. It makes us pause, reprioritize, and make sure we tell our children and friends we love them.
I know its hard to feel pity or sympathy for the perpetrator of these acts.
But I cannot imagine the pain, anguish and utter self hatred that must consume a human being for him to turn evil and heinous, and to feel that the only way to end that pain is to harm other fellow human beings. No doubt this person has parents and family too whose grief takes on a whole other form.
My daughter was one floor above where the dorm shooting took place when it took place. Its an eerie feeling, surreal–very hard if not impossible to make sense of. All day yesterday and last night I pondered what my role as parent should be. It ranged from the instinctive maternal reaction to run to her and to protect my "cub" to giving her the time and space she needed to sort it out and be with her friends. She was confused and didn't know what she wanted but I knew what I wanted. I wanted to hug her. That's it.
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