There are certain events that happen in America that are so significant that they stand as markers for our society and how it is developing. The election of Barack Obama to the presidency, is in itself a clear marker of the huge steps forward that America has made concerning racism and our history of slavery. It is a very simple representation of our progress. Like the breaking down of the Berlin Wall, it is a triumph in society; just another small step up the long ladder to world peace and harmony. There are other events that are not as understandable or clear. In a span of six months, four Palo Alto teenagers have taken their own lives by use of a Caltrain that runs through the heart of town. All four of these teens, ages 13 to 17, went to Henry M. Gunn high school. They were different individuals and all killed themselves for individual reasons, but there is one obvious similiarity. These young men and women were in such a severe amount of pain that they reached a breaking point. The pain became greater than their young hearts and minds could withstand. They did what seemed logical to them and they put themselves out of their misery. Liza Wataghani, an art dealer who has been a resident of Palo Alto for 23 years, recollects a particularly gruesome incident from years ago. A young man from the neighboring Palo Alto high school, was among the last players cut from the school basketball team. Later that night he went to the train tracks and laid down on them, waiting for his eventual relief. It happened within 150 feet of hundreds of screaming fans at the school football field, totally oblivious to what was happening just a few dozen yards away. We don’t know what caused him to take his life, though there are some people who are born with or naturally develop extreme mental imbalances. Some people are genetically hardwired to be suicidally depressed. But what about four teens from the same school, in the span of six months? There is no coincidence there, what you have there is four people who were more sad and depressed than the inexperienced person could possibly fathom. There are four sets of parents out there, and countless more all over the country with a dead child. Dead because they were so sad and tortured they had to stop the pain. What does it mean, what does it represent? It means something hugely more significant than the countless daily tragedies in our society. And until we can find and understand what it is in our society can overcome our most basic animal instinct, the mere instinct to live that is shared by every single living organism, we will be lost. Until that day we will still be a people in the dark, looking for markers to guide the way.
By KELSEY BLOOM
Staff writer
Popularity: unranked [?]
