Here are some words about something that happened.
Last Friday, an Albuquerque District Court judge declared a mistrial in the case against the driver who killed David Anderson. This news cut through the noise of everything else happening in my life and in the world right now. Yet I have written a few drafts of this post and still not figured out exactly what I want to say about it. I am often hasty and inarticulate in my passionate rush to express my opinions, but it’s not often that I’m just not sure what to -feel- about something.
A feeling that life is not fair. A feeling that common sense has died out completely. A feeling that the same things happen over and over again. A feeling that it’s always the good ones who go early. A feeling that the system is broken. Feelings of deja vu, feelings of the past rushing up to slap me in the present, and an achey feeling in certain body parts that makes me want to curl up and sleep for days. A feeling of hope that people are fighting for a change, fighting to fix the system, fighting to revive common sense and mutual respect, fighting for a kinda more beautiful world.
Sherry Anderson possesses a deep inner strength and an outward grace that I hope to achieve and maintain in my own life. She has been a positive presence in my life, offering strength and wisdom about the grieving process, and nurturing my own inner strength. We first met over a year ago, through my documentary film project.
I was introduced to Sherry Anderson through Jennifer Buntz, whom I met through the magical esoterica of the internets. Jennifer and her partner Steve Matthias founded the Duke City Wheelman Foundation and launched the first organized large scale ghost bikes project in Albuquerque. They have been tremendous supporters and participants in the film project. They are awesome people and I am grateful to have them in my life.
In Jennifer and Sherry I found complete understanding, sympathy, and affirmation that the thing to do in the face of loss is to create something beautiful and meaningful. We all three had some very similar things in common, and I experienced for perhaps the first time in my life a sense of tremendous relief in being able to speak openly on topics that have always been raw and ineffable.
The love in the bike community in Albuquerque is tremendous. It is beautiful.
Every time you are driving, remember this: your actions have consequences. The size of your vehicle amplifies your actions and their resulting consequences. We all make choices, and sometimes we make mistakes, but we are all required to take responsibility for our actions.
Your actions affect those around you and limit our ability to make our own choices. When you injure or kill someone with your vehicle, you have taken away their right to live on their own terms. You have created a permanent change in the lives of everyone involved. You have created suffering.
There is so much more I could say, but I’m not sure how to organize the words.
We are all connected.
