Sur­real. That’s the only word I can find to describe my emo­tions that day. It’s one thing if you see a dis­as­ter hit some­where else and you think, “Oh, those poor people”.

But it didn’t hap­pen some­where else. It hap­pened in the place where I used to sit in the hall­way before class, fever­ishly try­ing to fin­ish an assign­ment. It hap­pened in the place where my friends and I would laugh and joke in the cafe­te­ria dur­ing our lunch period. It hap­pened in the place where I stayed count­less hours in the com­puter lab tire­lessly work­ing on the school news­pa­per. It hap­pened where I grad­u­ated, where I cried as I closed that chap­ter of my life.

When a nat­ural gas explo­sion and build­ing col­lapse occurred at my high school, Min­nehaha Acad­emy, on August 2, I was dri­ving to work. I heard the announce­ment on Min­nesota Pub­lic Radio, my heart dropped. Pain racked my chest. I had to pull over to catch my breath. I had vis­ited the school just the week before, dis­cussing news­pa­per redesign for The Met­ro­pol­i­tan with my for­mer jour­nal­ism advisor.

The explo­sion occurred in the area where my senior locker would have been. I kept think­ing: It could have just as eas­ily been me had the cir­cum­stances been different.

Trag­i­cally, two staff mem­bers died. I didn’t know the vic­tims of the acci­dent per­son­ally, but they were a part of my Min­nehaha fam­ily. I couldn’t help but grieve for them and the community.

But the huge­ness of the tragedy didn’t really hit me until a few weeks after it hap­pened. Seniors this year wouldn’t get to prac­tice walk­ing across the same stage as I did. Fresh­men wouldn’t get lost in the maze of hall­ways as I did. Fac­ulty will never be the same with­out Ruth Berg and John Carlson.

As much as I strug­gled in high school, Min­nehaha was the best place for me to be. I grap­pled with men­tal ill­ness dur­ing my junior and senior years, but I couldn’t have asked for a more sup­port­ive com­mu­nity. My coun­selors, teach­ers and peers assured me that I was suc­cess­ful even if I felt quite the oppo­site. They lifted me up.

Min­nehaha shaped who I am today. I will be for­ever grate­ful for the sup­port net­work that I had — and con­tinue to have as an alumna.

I took it for granted that Min­nehaha would stay the same when I closed my locker for the last time. I thought I would leave my high school edu­ca­tion behind me, move on and never look back on those dif­fi­cult years.

In the wake of this heart­break­ing event, I finally came to the real­iza­tion that Min­nehaha will always be a part of me. I will always be a Min­nehaha Red­hawk. And hawks soar together.