Steve Berrell

The twenty-first of December is rapidly approaching. Most people will be out in the bustling crowds that day. They will be finishing up or in some cases, starting their holiday shopping.

It will come and go without much fanfare and on the 22nd for everyone, another day to be forgotten. Not for me.

At 19:02 p.m. on December twenty-first, I will be outside looking at the sky, towards the North. I will be remembering Steven Berrell.

We were friends in high school, not best friends or even good friends, but we were friends. The way high school students are friends.

He had a certain gait when he walked, a sort of leaning to the left and then to the right. Steve was tall and lanky. He wasn't hard to miss, but the thing that struck me was that big goofy smile that seemed to be plastered on his face. Steve came from a pretty well off family, but you would never know. He was sincere, kind and never auspicious, although he did have a certain affection for button down shirts. 

 

He was also shy in some respects. Maybe it was because he was the younger brother of a larger than life older one. Rob was a year ahead of me and Steve a year behind. Like in most smaller mid west towns, families with multiple kids make up the high school. The classes become a mix of grades. You end up with one or the other in a class or two. 

 

He did like to crack a joke, especially with his buddy Eric Olafson. The two of them could get an entire class going in a matter of minutes, but he wasn't the class clown. This is the Steve I remember.

 

Others will remember him as brilliant young man and rightly so. Steve was one of those rare people that you just knew was going to be "someone".  He had that drive and ambition. The kind of drive that made him aspire for a double major at Syracuse University. To go to London to study abroad, even for just one semester.

I remember this date every year. I remember my mom calling to tell me the news. The horrible news. The horrible news that on a crisp beautiful December day, my high school friend Steven Russell Berrell, seat 46F, was blown out of the sky. He was dead, as well as 269 others.

This year marks the twentieth anniversary of Pan Am flight 103. Considered the deadliest air terrorism event of its time, it is all but forgotten, just a page in history. There were 35 students on board, considered some of the brightest the United States had to offer.

 

We will never know what they would have become, what impact they would have had. Parents who spoke at the hearings thought their deaths would not be in vain. That changes in security would prevent another attack from ever happening again. People believed it was safe to fly. How wrong we were.

 

That day I simply lost a friend and with it my youth. The world lost much more.  

 

Reviews

[Kevin Vorshak]

Again, JC, another powerful piece. This is truly a wonderful beginning chapter. Oddly, or maybe not oddly, timed due to the release of the terrorist that planted the explosive. Of all things, due to having cancer and not having long to live. Why show this animal any compassion at all? He didn't show any compassion to the people of Pan Am Flight 103.

I'm off my soapbox. Stupendous writing, by the way. Tremendous build up of Steve's life and the type of person he is. We know something happens to him, but then comes the tie to Pan Am Flight 103. Gave me chills.

[Wildfleour]

I have suffered this loss and know how it hurts. Unfortunately it never goes away completely; we just learn to deal with it (as cliche as that sounds, it's true).

[Otter]

Touching, simply touching, we lose friends, family, loved ones, some close, some not so much, but we never forget. Well done. Thank you.