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Welcome to Stuff I Learned Yesterday. My name is Darrell Darnell, I am terrible at keeping plants in my yard alive, and I believe that if you aren’t learning, you aren’t living. In today’s episode of Stuff I Learned Yesterday I’ll share a story about a city transformed by a tremendous tragedy.
Friday Forum
You know what would be cool? An all female Friday Forum would be cool. I already have one contribution ready for this Friday and I would love to make this Friday’s episode all insights from the wisdom of women. It can be a message as short as 30 seconds or several minutes long. It really doesn’t matter just as long as it’s something that will benefit others. You can participate in Friday Forum by calling and leaving a message at 304-837-2278, emailing an audio file to feedback@goldenspiralmedia.com, or clicking on the Send Voicemail tab on my website, GoldenSpiralMedia.com.
What I Learned Yesterday:
Today’s story begins on an ordinary Wednesday, in an ordinary dorm room in 1995. I was nearly finished with my first year of college, and as the semester was drawing to a close, I had a few assignment deadlines approaching. One of the assignments was for a paper I had to write. I have no idea which class it was or what the paper was about.
What I do remember is that on this particular day I was up early trying to finish the paper before I headed off to work. It was shortly before 9am. I fired up the computer and turned on the local radio station. I sat there typing away for several minutes and didn’t think much of it when I heard a rumbling sound above me. I thought the guys in the room upstairs must have dragged something heavy across the floor.
A few minutes later there was an interruption on the radio. The morning DJ announced that a major explosion had just occurred in downtown Oklahoma City. It was now just a few minutes after 9am and 168 lives, 19 of them children, had just been lost as a Ryder truck filled with explosives was detonated at the base of the Alfred P. Murrah federal building.
I jumped up from my desk and ran down the hall to the lobby to find the nearest TV. A few guys were there watching ESPN and I told them to turn it to a news station because a bomb had just gone off downtown. Of course what I said sounded ridiculous and they scoffed. I would have too. I urged them again to change the channel and they did. What we saw next was incomprehensible.
The images on the TV looked like a war zone from a foreign country. There was fire and smoke; glass and debris; blood and tears. This was not a foreign country, this was my home town.
That dark day was 19 years ago this week. It’s hard to believe that much time has passed, and yet it seems like an eternity ago.
I stood in the lobby of my dorm for who knows how long, watching the carnage and hoping beyond hope that the death count would stop rising. At some point the news broadcast made a plea for blood donors and since my blood type is O, they were calling for people like me to donate. I called my boss and asked if I could be late so that I could go donate blood. She said that I could have the day off. Giving blood was more important, besides, no one was shopping, they were all glued to their TV sets.
When I arrived at the nearest Oklahoma Blood Institute, there was a line out the door, down the sidewalk and through the parking lot. It was a tremendous outpouring of support and they no longer needed blood of any type. My roommate and I decided to try and see if there was anything we could do or see downtown. The downtown area was locked down tight. They weren’t allowing anyone anywhere near the bomb site and there was nothing we could do to help.
Nearly every single person I knew was effected by the bomb in some way. I had friends who lost parents, aunts or uncles, grandparents, cousins. My uncle had his office in that building, near the window, right above where the Ryder truck was parked. Fortunately, he was working at Tinker Air Force Base that day. Unfortunately, nearly every single one of the coworkers in his office were not. Nearly everyone he worked with perished that day.
In the months that followed, after we’d honored and buried our dead, cleaned up the mess, arrested those involved, and had time to reflect, the city had to decide what to do next. Those in leadership positions understood that this would be a moment that defined Oklahoma and its capital city. They looked for ways that they could honor the lives lost, and rise stronger from the ashes. They determined that what was intended to harm and destroy would instead be used to build up and bring hope.
Oklahoma City began to see the need to rebuild in 1993 with a citizen passed self-imposed tax. The tax carried the promise of using that money for Metropolitan Area Projects, or MAPs. However, that day in April 19 years ago brought us together stronger than ever before and galvanized us. I don’t think the Oklahoma City that I see around me every day would be here if not for that tragic April morning.
With the first MAPs tax funding we renovated the Civic Center Music Hall, Cox Convention Center, and the state fairgrounds. We build one of the best minor league baseball stadiums in the country and a new sports arena called the Ford Center. We built the Bricktown Canal system, a new four-story library and overhauled public transit. It also involved damming up the Oklahoma River and we now have one of the best rowing and training facilities in the world.
By the way, the Ford Center, now known as the Chesapeake Energy Arena was completed in 2002. We had no way of knowing just how important that building would be to our city. Without that building, we would have had no place to house the New Orleans Hornets from 2005-2007 after Hurricane Katrina. Without that NBA experience, we never would have had any chance of having the Thunder call Oklahoma City their home.
We went on to pass another MAPs project called MAPs For Kids which made significant improvements to area school facilities, technology improvements, and transportation upgrades. We’re now on our third MAPs tax. Plans are already well under way for a new downtown convention center, a large public park downtown, a new streetcar system, senior citizen wellness centers, and biking trails.
The best part? All of these improvements to our city have been paid for debt free.
I know this episode has sounded like one big chamber of commerce commercial for Oklahoma City, and I promise they have no idea who I am or that this podcast exists. I tell you all of this about my city because it has taught me a lot about personal character.
Here’s what I learned. Tragedy sometime will strike is such a big way that it touches a whole city or state like it did here on April 19, 1995 or even a whole nation like it did in New York, Washington DC, and Pennsylvania on September 11, 2001. However, most of the time tragedy strikes in a more personal way by hitting individuals or families.
Tragedy comes in a variety of ways and wears many masks. It can come as a child in the form of physical, sexual, or verbal abuse. It can come at the hands of a drunk driver or war. Sometimes it knocks on our doors wearing the mask of cancer or other disease. Tragedy is no respecter of age, gender, nationality, or religion. It hits us all.
Whether we like it or not, tragedy will define us. However, we get to choose what definition will get filled in that space following tragedy. Will it define us as defeated, empty, worn, and broken? Will we be burned, angry, hopeless, and despondent? Maybe we’ll be stronger, inspired, focus, and reinvigorated. Perhaps we’ll define ourselves as teacher, leader, helper, friend, or healer.
I know that it’s not easy. It’s never easy. Maybe you’ve overcome tragedy. Maybe you’re in the middle of a fight. Maybe you’ve allowed tragedy to define you in a way that you hate. It’s not over. It’s not too late. May this podcast bring you hope and the realization that the definition in that space following tragedy was written in with pencil and as long as there is breath in your lungs then there is an eraser available to you and the promise that you can be something greater BECAUSE of tragedy.
I’m Darrell Darnell and this has been stuff I learned yesterday.
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