4/16

Tomorrow is April 16th. It shouldn't be a special day. In fact, it used to be a completely ordinary day. However, I am a Virginia Tech Hokie and April 16th is now forever special for all the wrong reasons.

Whenever anyone asks me what it was like to 'be there' I get upset. I don't get upset at them for asking. Far from it. It shows they care, at least a little. I get upset at myself because I never have any idea how to answer them.

I recently read one of Chuck Klosterman's books. He writes collections of essays, and oftentimes throws in passages from a random interview he once did. This is one of those passages. I have no idea what the original interview was pertaining to, nor does it really matter. The fact is, after I read through it, I immediately thought of myself after someone asks me what it was like to 'be there.'

“Q. How did that make you feel?

A. No idea.

Q. Oh, come on. How did it make you feel?

A. I don’t know. I know what you expect me to say, and I know what kind of response you're hoping I'll give you, and I know how other people might feel if they were in my position, and I know that I'm supposed to feel something, because this was a very traumatic event. But I don’t know how I feel, even though I know there are feelings somewhere inside me. It's just that I can't possibly verbalize what that feeling feels like.

Q. Why don’t you just try? Who cares if you're wrong? What is the harm in being wrong?

A. Because why would I want to get something wrong just so it will make more sense to you? It still won't make any sense to me.”

-Chuck Klosterman, Eating the Dinosaur (very entertaining book by the way.)

I'd say more, but I don't know what to say.