The Way I Am

In many ways I am who I am because of Columbine.

Starting around the time I was 15 or 16 I began the slow process of disassociating myself with everything that made me who I was. From going to youth camps where well-intentioned pastors suggested, in so many ways, that the way life and church and reality occurred at home just wasn't up to snuff, to watching MTV where the pictures entering my brain were much more polished and bright than the landscape of Chandler, I began sensing that there was trouble in Dodge and I wanted out.

So I tried to get out. I went away for a semester to college. When circumstance and desire dictated that I return home, I returned home. But existentially I continued getting out. I became involved in a church in a neighboring town that offered an alternative to my perceived ritualistic religion going on back home. Anything "traditional" was anathema in my mind. Worship necessitated guitars and drums and an absence of a choir replaced by three or four people with good voices and a keen ability to contort their faces and raise their hands when the spirit moved.

When I went to ETBU a "calling to missions" led me twice to Estonia, a country so remote and different from East Texas that rarely when it is mentioned does anyone know where or what the hell it is. "Asstonia? Is that Russia? Isn't that from Encino Man?" I'd drop my world travels in casual conversation just so people will know who it is they are dealing with. This aint no Chandler boy anymore. This is a cultured person who knows. Whatever it is, he knows.

Another summer in college my contacts from Estonia hooked me up with an internship in Washington D.C. for United States Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison from Texas. Yep, Neches Street was no longer relevant. I'm riding the Metro to Union Station and walking, in my suit, down Constitution Avenue, through Stanton Park to the Russel Senate Office Building. My job would take me daily through the underground tram that connected the Senate and House buildings to the Capitol.

It seemed as if I had finally succeeded in doing what every small town person wants to do-- Escape.

My conversation was no longer littered with the seemingly trivial minutiae of who ate dinner with whom and what church is doing what these days. But rather I was talking about big ideas. Cultural ideas. International concerns. Abstract thoughts that were reserved for the elite.

This modus operandi continued through the next move in my life, becoming a part of Senator Hutchison's full time staff in her Dallas office. More escape. I'd been further away geographically from my heritage, but personally I was moving at light speed away from it. More "intelligent" conversation. More freedom from the simpleton ethos that had dominated my life for many years.

Less you misunderstand where this is going, I wasn't heading down a sinful path. Arrogance is not where this was leading. But it wasn't leading to humility either. It was a far greater sin than arrogance. It was the sin of denying who I was.

Then on May 14, 1999 Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, possessed by all that is evil (I'm still a Republican, I can use that word liberally,) walked into Columbine High School and began picking people off left and right in a sight of sheer horror that is shadowed in my memory only by another significant national event that occurred a couple of years later. We saw the news around noon that day and were deeply moved and frightened for the parents who would soon be getting calls from police. We knew it would turn into a national news story immediately. But I don't think we expected it to turn into what it did.

I finished the workday, went home, and did nothing that evening but watch the news. I woke up the next morning to my same routine. Showered and got ready for work, then watched what I'd planned on only being the first 20 minutes of the Today show before I went to get a paper. Instead I watched until 10 till eight, the time I had to walk out my door in order to make it into the office, just around the corner from my apartment.

The reason for the extended viewing was Katie Couric's interview with the father of Isaiah Shoels and the brother of Cassie Bernall. It was one of the most moving experiences I'd ever seen before or since on television. The show normally does twenty minutes of hard news then cuts to commercial then local news. On this particular occasion, however, Katie had the network stay on the interview. I'd never seen more compassion and humanity occur in an interview in my life. Sheol's father was obviously very grief stricken and Katie was there for him, had him take is time in sharing about his son. There was a moment when she and Cassie Bernall's brother reached over and put their hands on the guys shoulder, and I just lost it. I was crying for the rest of the day. I knew from that moment that the day would be hectic.

For here was my job: Talking to constituents. I monitored media coverage of Senator Hutchison, assisted caseworkers in strong arming federal agencies into responding to people's needs, and handled all mail. But my main job was answering the phones. When you here someone with a political cause implore you to call your Senator or Representative, I was the guy you spoke with. On a normal day I spoke with around 50 people. That day I spoke with over 300.

What were the calls about? You guessed it. Gun Control. The NRA aficionados were calling in anticipation of the gun-control push that would inevitably happen. The gun control advocates called and accused the Senator of murder for not pursuing tighter gun control laws (even though every singe weapon used in Columbine was illegal.) All those people. Over 300 in an eight hour period. All of them indirectly accusing my boss, and by extension, me, of either murder or taking away inalienable rights. That's a pretty stressful day.

And here is where, in a sense, my life changed. This is one of those moments that prove, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that words are powerful and mean something. It's one of those experiences where something said in passing, without any intention at all other than an immediate statement, becomes a life changing statement.

On the elevator ride to the bottom floor I was talking to one of my coworkers, Brenda Davis, who is a caseworker whose desk was closest to mine. She said something to the effect of this... "It was a rough day today, huh? Craig, I heard you talking on the phone, and I'm quite impressed. You have such a down home charm that probably comes straight out of Chandler."

It was then that I realized the thing I was trying to get away from was one of those things that are inescapable. And these words from Magnolia, which I've only recently seen, took on immense relevance... "You may be done with the past, but the past aint done with you." And also these words from Maya Angelou, while describing the songwriting of Loretta Lynn... "She took her upbringing in Butcher Holler and she didn't run from it. She took all the pain and joy from that place, and let it walk beside her wherever she went."

From that moment on I've made a conscious choice of not running from Chandler, but embracing it, and showing off that aspect of who I am whenever I get the chance. My identity is very rooted in "small town" and "quaint" and "simple."

And believe me, I know the risks I take for doing that, indeed, even for sharing this with you. I risk, most of all, the thing that is my identity becoming the thing that is my schtick, my act to the rest of the world. And that's a definite temptation, but one I have to walk with and trust that those who know me will also know where I am coming from, quite literally.

I also risk using Chandler (I use the word "Chandler" not necessarily to denote the town that is between Tyler and Athens, but rather my small town upbringing) as a shield from the things I could become. I've often become tired of thinking intellectually and hearkened back to the arguments of "common man-- common wisdom) excuses for not thinking and not engaging. I always have to realize that East Texas isn't heaven, it's just East Texas. And I have to engage the world I'm in, not the one I romanticize.

So, that's who I am. Or maybe that's who I want to be. Either way, I'm going to embrace it. When given the choice of speaking with irony or speaking with simple-mindedness, I'm going to try my hardest to choose the latter. When given the choice of change or preservation, I'm naturally going to lean toward preservation. I'm always going to think it's better to not build a building when one is not needed than to tear down a tree to put up some butt ugly place. I want to get back to waving at people in my car, regardless of whether or not I know them. I still think it's a better thing to avoid conflict whenever it is possible. I think it's better to live in a world where you stop in and check up on your neighbors than one in which you protect yourself from them.

In short, I'm going to continue taking 513 Neches Drive, Chandler, Texas, USA, World, Universe and letting it walk beside me wherever I go.