I will never forget my mother’s weeping at the images on our television. Pictures of fireman carrying children, bodies bloodied and broken. A massive gaping hole in a building and rubble everywhere. The bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City will always be the defining schism between my sheltered, peaceful childhood and the harsh ugliness of “the real world”. My innocence was lost on this day.

As a teenager, I did not fully grasp the magnitude of the event, nor understand how any human could intentionally inflict such horror on others, including babies. Unfortunately, the 20 years since have introduced to my consciousness the vast and seemingly boundless capacity people possess to destroy each other. It seems unfathomable that two decades have passed since this life altering tragedy. Twenty years. Continue reading →