A death hits close to home

A few weeks ago, I found an old journal from close to 40 years ago, from when I was in college, and read an entry where I mentioned that I had an exam the next day in my Economics class. The day’s events came rushing back to me. I was worried about how unprepared I was and questioning how I was going to do on the exam, but it was far from my biggest priority. Unfortunately, I had bigger things on my mind.

I was a freshman working on my college’s daily newspaper. I was in the newspaper office late one November evening finishing up a feature story when a call came over the police scanner that there had been a pedestrian accident on the edge of campus. The accident sounded bad.

A few minutes later, we learned a little more. A guest researcher from China working at the university had been hit by a car when she was crossing the road. And then a few minutes later, we learned that emergency personnel were calling the coroner to the scene. The accident had turned into a fatality.

You! I need you!

The editor on call, a senior, stood up and looked around the office, seeing what reporters he could assign the story. I looked down, I rarely talked to him, and didn’t even think he knew my name. Okay, I was scared to death of him. He was a couple years older than me, but he seemed so sophisticated and smarter than me. He had a habit of putting his finger to the side of his cheek like he was considering some deep question. The room was packed with other students, most of them sophomores and juniors. Surprisingly, though, he pointed to me and told me I would have a front page story if I could track down the story.

A front page story byline.

He must have known the magic words to say. A front page story, my first, or studying for my exam? I’d like to say that I carefully weighed the pros and the cons. I’d like to think that I considered how I hadn’t really had a chance to study or prepare for my exam, but I know I didn’t. The minute he said the words front page byline, I was all-in, grades be damn.

Fighting the clock

I spent the rest of the evening on one of the black landline phones in the office trying to track down the details of the story. I was on deadline and didn’t have much time. The accident was particularly sad. The pedestrian in the dark evening light was hit by a car and then hit and drug several feet by a second car. There were no charges filed against the drivers, she was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, but police were continuing to investigate.

At one point, the editor checked in on me to see how I was doing and asked if I had talked to any of the researcher’s family or friends.

I looked at him aghast. Really? You want me to call?

I wanted to claim that I was mere freshman, but he told me that I, at least, needed to try to reach out to see if any friends or family wanted to talk. He told me to be respectful, but to still make the call.

Giving myself a pep talk

My heart sank, but I made a few calls and found a coworker who had been working with the woman and wanted to talk about how professional she was and how important her research was to the Engineering field. He talked about how there were plans already in the works to continue the research in her name.

I was running out of time. I sat down and started cranking out the story. I stuck to the basics, keeping things simple, and matter of fact, and told the story. In the end, it was eight or nine inches long. I read the story one more time and handed it over to the editor. He cut a few things, changed a few others, and sent it to another editor to read and then off to the designer. (Another writer would come back later and write a series on busy intersections and what the university was doing to improve them.)

The story would run on page one below an AP story on President Reagan defending the secret arms sale to Iran and above a story another writer on staff had written about students drawing attention to the increase in homelessness by sleeping outside in the cold on makeshift cardboard beds. When I packed up my backpack to leave, the editor told me “good job.”

I think I was too shocked to say much in return.

In a state of shock

I made the walk in the brisk fall air back to my dorm. My roommate, a sophomore, had no classes the next day and tried to cheer me up by convincing me to go to a party with him, but I turned him down. Instead, I opened my Econ book and notes and then promptly put them aside, turned out the lights and going to bed. (For the record, I can’t recall the grade I got on the Econ exam the next day, but it wasn’t one of the brighter moments in my educational career.)

When I closed my eyes, I couldn’t get over the contrast in situations. I would wake up the next day to the first front page story in my writing career. My life was just getting started, but another student, a few years older than me, had lost her life. She was simply walking across a street and was now dead.

I didn’t know the researcher, but I couldn’t get her death out of my head. I kept thinking of her books and backpack sprayed across the intersection. Her death seemed like such a waste. I stared at the ceiling for a long time before tears crept into the corners of my eyes and I fell asleep.

When the paper came out the next day, I picked up several copies and felt torn. Yes, indeed, I was learning a big life lesson: one career was getting off the ground and another was stopped in its tracks.