I like to bounce stories off my wife. Not literally. But I appreciate her take on things, since she's a much more empathetic soul than I am.
I think her reaction is very much like what most of our readers would have.
She will tell me when she thinks we're pushing the envelope.
I enjoy gauging her reactions.
We both were saddened as we watched the news over the weekend of the horrific SUV crash that snuffed out three promising young lives. The trio of students attended Council Rock South High School in Bucks County. They were killed when the SUV in which they were riding with some friends rolled over in northeastern Pennsylvania.
There are two kinds of stories that make my wife blanche - anyhing involving kids, and stories about animals. She literally can't watch those tear-jerker Sarah McLachlan commercials for the SPCA.
She was near tears in watching the story on the crash.
"How can you deal with this stuff every day? she asked? It sort of goes with the territory. You work in this business for very long, and you build up a pretty thick exterior. Inside you might be dying, but outside we strive to remain calm outside observers.
That's probably why she was puzzled when I said, "That's not the whole story."
"What do you mean," she quizzed me, even though I think she knew where I was going.
"What happened?" I said what I usually do in these cases. I just hope we don't find out something else was involved in this crash.
Yesterday afternoon we started to find out exactly that.
A 15-year-old girl from New York was behind the wheel, and investigators suspect she may have been speeding. In New York you need to be 16 to have a valid driver's license.
But it is what my wife said after our initial conversation that has stayed with me as I returned to the office this week.
"What difference does it make?" she said. "Three kids are gone. Can you imagine what their parents are going through."
Actually, I can't. It's a parent's worst nightmare, something that was amplified by Wayne County District Attorney Janine Edwards in noting that "Pennsylvania State Police will investigate the incident to the fullest."
The teen girl is likely to be charged in juvenile court.
It won't bring back those three kids. It won't ease the agony of Council Rock South High School.
And it won't erase the questions an editor asks every time this kind of tragedy occurs.
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