Not a Word from Your Sponsors

Saturday night, you could see the following type of exchanges happening on facebook for those of us in Santa Rosa:

Does anyone know why [highway] 12 is closed?

I heard there was a big accident.

Yeah, a bad crash with 2 fatalities. (links to local paper's website)

Oh, man. That sucks.  end scene, go on with your night

Sunday morning, those of us at church arrived to find out that those "fatalities" were our friend, Sue Hufford, and her mother-in-law, Sharon. I'm not going to recap the whole thing here, but they were killed (hopefully) instantly when their stopped car was crushed by a truck going 60mph driven by a young man who was high and looking at his phone at the time. Her husband and father-in-law were taken to the hospital with injuries, but they lived.

I cannot claim to have been close to Sue, so my pain is only a fraction of the pain of her many students, mentees, closest friends, and family. But we liked each other a lot. We were co-leaders (called "sherpas" in our church youth group) of a group of 12-21 (depending on the week) high school girls about 4 years ago.

Our silly group, with Sue being the non-redheaded adult there on the left. We made our shirts, which say "HOLLA" big with (lujah) underneath. We thought they were REAL funny. Some of the girls are also making the Michael Nunan stinkface.

 

Sue was quiet, especially when you first met her. Her closest friends may have seen her differently, but I always thought she was quiet. It surprised me that she wanted to work with high school girls, and also that she was an elementary school teacher. I felt like she was such a real adult compared to me. She wasn't very silly that year, and I often thought she didn't like me. (We won't discuss the game involving plastic wrap and a furniture dolly which sent her to the hospital that first night of youth group.)

Over the years, Sue and I chatted from time to time about how she and her kids were doing, but it was really after I became a foster parent that I think we connected more. She was always happy to hear about what was going on in our new lives as parents. In this past year, I had a number of really nice but short times with her. I saw her smile more than I'd had call to in the past. At our women's Open Mic night last year, I would have been thrilled if she really had been the one who could cackle like the Wicked Witch of the West in the game of To Tell the Truth that she participated in, and she awed us all with her talent when she played a few songs on the violin. Why were we surprised that a music teacher was so talented?

We sat and talked at her youngest's graduation party, and ran into each other at The Human Race, where she was raising funds for her salary like a sort of missionary of elementary music. Just the week before she was killed, I got to sit with her twice at different events. I sat with her and Jay at the Eagle ceremony for a young man from church. Even though she was wearing an Eagle Scout shirt from when one of her sons had achieved it, we knew each other well enough that I could lean over and mutter, "This is SO not my thing!" and she just laughed and said, "Yeah, it's a bit over the top." When I showed up for the first practice for Easter choir, I was so happy to see that she was there. She sat by me and, again, I was impressed by her talent and was glad to know that I could sit by her each week and be sure I had the right notes since I'm not a good music reader. We weren't close, but she was my friend and I'm just so sad.

There has been a tremendous outpouring of support and love and even outrage expressed over how they were killed. So many people have shared the news stories, even people who never met her, because it was a tragedy that didn't need to happen. This is good. I suppose that's a way that her death won't have been completely pointless: if people will stop texting and driving and be more aware; if other lives can be saved. A lesson can be learned. I know. I know this is important, but it also hurts a little bit. Amid all the "sorry for your loss"es and "can't we put away our phones?" I just want to yell "DON'T YOU GET IT! THIS IS HORRIBLE. MORE HORRIBLE THAN THAT! SHE WAS OUR FRIEND AND NOW SHE'S DEAD! SHE'S MORE THAN YOUR PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT!" I'm afraid that her kids will heal hardened instead of tender. I'm afraid that I'll never see Jay smile and cracking a joke like he was every single time I ever saw him before this.


I know. I know. I'm being unreasonable. Maybe all humans are kinesthetic learners: we have to touch something and feel it before we can learn it. Our behavior isn't going to change until something is personal, and I hope that the degrees of separation between these deaths and you are few enough to do that for you. Personally, I have changed my phone behavior in the car, so I'm receiving the message, too. I can't make you cry for my friend, but I will accept that you have been affected by her story and will honor these deaths by changing your behavior and encouraging those around you to do the same. Let's do a better job of taking care of each other, okay?

CHIC

This is the first of 2 posts about my 2 weeks of mayhem. Both were great, but there's a lot to tell. The next post will cover our vacation.

Week 1: CHIC (Covenant High In Christ)- the triennial youth conference for our denomination. This was my first time attending, and it did not disappoint. Well, I would have liked to bond a little bit more with my girls, but oh well.

We all had our fabulous matching t-shirts at the airport bright & early on Saturday morning, so that we could more easily keep track of our group of 42. (This picture was taken on our last day, waiting for the flight home. Thanks, Susie.) The CHIC logo is the weird yellow thing, so our staff designed PacMan themed shirts because of the resemblance.

After hanging out at the airport for quite a while, we boarded our plane to Nashville, with all of us taking up the rear of the plane. I was in the very back row with a girl who had never flown before and one of my sweet girls who brings nothing on flights with her because she wants to talk. (And I complain about not bonding!) We tease each other about that.

We rented minivans in Nashville & spend the night in town, taking over a local restaurant for dinner, followed by the swarming of the hotel pool. The next day, we drove to Knoxville, which was a beautiful drive to a cute town.

We stayed in dorms, which were fine. All the kids roomed together, and adults roomed together. That was nice. The campus is HUGE and Tennessee is HOT, so there was weight loss, for sure. Lots of sweating and walking. Even at 8 in the morning, we were sweaty. I love the South, but I'm glad I live in CA where there's dry heat.

Each day consisted of breakfast in a nearby dorm, followed by 2 group sessions somewhere else on campus dealing with the topics of relating to yourself, to God, to the World, and to Others. Most of them were very good. One dealt with faking it and putting on masks, another was a great worship session that felt very real & jam-like. Another had an exercise about judging people that was good, and there was also a day educating us on human trafficking (there is a LOT of it. Seriously).

The afternoons were filled with free time for the kids to do anything they wanted, including a number of excursions. There were sports tournaments of all kinds, chess, crafts, swimming, water slides, bowling, bands playing outside. It was great. I mostly wandered with Susie (blue tank top on the left above), and sometimes tried to take a nap. One day, though, I did run into town (really, I ran. It was hot.) to buy Harry Potter tickets, as it opened the Wednesday we were there. That afternoon, 20 of us walked/ran into downtown Knoxville to watch the movie, which was a lot of fun. Another afternoon, I went white water rafting with Susie & 3 of the girls, which was great. I had never done it before, and we had a lot of fun, especially laughing at one of our girls falling out of the raft.
The evenings were dinner in the dorm, then Main Stage, which was at the arena. About 8000 people gathered for concerts, worship, and speakers. All the speakers were very good, but I believe that Shane Claiborne was the best, and the kids loved him, too. After you look at his site, you'll say, "Of course you loved the commune-living hippie, Robin!"

We also saw the David Crowder Band, which was more fun than I expected; Flyleaf, which was very loud and I took too long to start dancing and get into it; Israel Houghton & New Breed, which I loved due to nostalgia for his leading worship at Lakewood; and Third Day, who I liked and respected much more than I thought I would do. Also, on the first night, the daughter of our speaker, Erwin McManus, played with her band, Glare of Rockets, which is my new favorite band. (When you listen on myspace, know that live her voice didn't feel so sweet & they were much more dark & wall-of-sound feeling. She's like a mixture of Paramore & Mazzy Starr.)

Some of our students won the short film contest, and the video doesn't appear to be his youtube page, so I'll post it later. It was pretty funny. People learned, cried, bonded, grew. It was good. We were at Main Stage until at least 11pm every night, and ate pizza every night after. Got about 6 hours of sleep or less, sweated, trekked, had a good time. I got a foot massage in the airport before our departing flight, which was lovely. I'll definitely go again, but hopefully, a bunch of us won't get sick next time.