"From There to Hear"

We can't see it anymore clearer than we did the first time we saw the video shot during the party. It was like being transported back to a place in time. A place we were not present, nor had ever been, but you knew step by step what was going to occur. We remember seeing these people having fun, dancing, laughing, and seeing the time on the camera screen 12:45 and thinking, little do these people know that in less than an hour some of their lives will change forever. Some drastically. I remember on the whole 30-40 minute tape QT is only seen on camera for a few seconds, briefly. Too brief, moving past the lens in a panoramic view, from where only he know, to only where he knows. It was very eerie and surreal to us because looking back at my own situations in life (RJ), In hindsights view I can see the events unfolding and wonder why I could not see them at the moment. But for those brief seconds, you see him in an instant too fast to make an assumption on his intentions that night and then he's gone. A phantom... A memory to the tapes mind. The weird part is, when we ran that scene in slow motion, he passes so slowly, that he stops for a split second and looks directly into the camera. Eyes black, you can almost see the reflection of the camera in his eyes..... or is it something else? Is it HOPE? Or is it a clock ticking down to the last seconds on life as he knew it? Seconds before he enters into another journey, one from whence, he is not positive that he will return from. I called it that night, to my wife Joanne "A Deer in the Headlights Look" I remember thinking what if God had chose that camera light to shine in his eyes to touch his soul, to open his mind to hear God's voice and he whispered, "Go Home Son". What if? What if he did? Are we so wrapped into ourselves, that we do not hear God's whispering? Does at times he need to SHAKE our world so violently that we hear him?

As he passed by the camera we wondered what he was thinking? If, in the 8-9 years since does he remember these few seconds? I wonder in his face, can his family see the child they raised, all the laughs, the tears, the birthday parties him blowing out candles, all the Christmas's, him un-wrapping gifts, the first day of schools, the first crushes, the tender, "mom I love you's" or the "Tia I miss you" , or even now as a man does he understand the struggle to answer a child's question with delicate words so they can understand..... Its as if all the memories of moments in his life are all wrapped up into that single second. That brief look the eyes say "I love you to his family, but forgive me for this is my rite to manhood". The decision I make in the next few seconds of being at the wrong place at the wrong time will lead me on a journey that I may never return from.

It's a reminder that everywhere at every moment life is changing around us. Every previous breath, every thought is a past memory, recorded and filed away. You cant stop change, we all change for better or for worse. Myself, I never questioned QT's guilt, or lack there of, its irrelevent to me. Only because we are all guilty of something. Each of us write our own story in destiny. We script our own plays, we are just selfless actors, playing the starring role in our personal movie, but as humans, we must put on a performance that is deserving and worthy of an ovation. And then God willing and ENCORE! PART I

Joanne & RJ