Just An Ordinary Friday

Just An Ordinary Friday

–OCTOBER 12TH, 1979

By Joel Elveson

The history books are written by historians who chronicle moments that will be forever frozen in time. Moments of exhilaration, sadness, love, hate with everything else in between. Playwrights, dictators, presidents, world leaders, musicians, actors, actresses, heroes, heroines, astronauts, to name but a few are all captured to be recreated in front of our wondering eyes with the mere tap on a key from a computer or cellphone keypad. What there is to see will be seen. What there is to hear will be heard. What there is to know will be known. What is not yet been said, seen, heard, or known may never be so. Perhaps or perhaps not that is the way it will be according to man in accordance with his plan.

For most of humanity Friday, October 12th, 1979 was just Friday, October 12th, 1979. True it was another day of this planet we call earth orbited around the sun. Most of us already knew that but aside for astronomy/science buffs we yawn at this often repeated fact. Just another day. There were births as there were deaths. Just another ordinary Friday, October 12th, 1979. Nine of the prior 14 days in New York City saw significant rainfall. The weather was on the cool side. Probably around 61 degrees or so. Not much more than that you need to know. This story unfolds in the next paragraph.

What are the chances that a whole family would be killed on that day by a high school dropout/wannabe actor but only one person died? Why was it that at 7:15 am a four foot and eleven-inch tall 26 year old woman who weighed all of 80 pounds chose to run down the staircase of the building she lived in so she could get to her job as a teacher at a Day Care Center where she so joyously and so lovingly taught handicapped children but instead was dragged up to the 6th floor landing of her building whereupon she was stripped, sexually assaulted mutilated with a knife or razor and strangled with the strap of her pocketbook. With a ball‐point pen, a message was scrawled across her chest that the police would not disclose. The attacker also robbed her of jewelry and money. What are the chances her 66thbirthday would fall out on Sunday, July 21st, 2019 which coincided with the Fast Of Tamuz which signals the onset of the three week period of mourning over the destruction of the Beit Hamikdash (Holy Temple)? WHAT ARE THE CHANCES OF THIS? HOW WOULD YOU FEEL IF THIS HAPPENED TO YOUR SISTER WHOM YOU ANGRILY FOUGHT WITH THE NIGHT BEFORE HER DEATH AND SAID THE DISGUSTING THINGS YOU SAID THAT IN PART CAME TRUE? AGAIN, WHAT ARE THE CHANCES OF THIS AND HOW WOULD YOU FEEL?

Forty years have come and gone since what can only be referred to as “that day.” So why is there still no sense of accepting the fact the past cannot be changed? There is no feeling or sense of leaving the past behind as only one surviving family member will not let it be. An emphatic dismissive wave of your hand will not make everything okay again. Open profusely bleeding wounds to the heart may never heal. Real soulful pain in order to have meaning must always be felt. Yes, you can laugh, sing, run or jump again but the pain must always be there. That sudden sharp jab emanating inexplicably from your ribs will interrupt slumber or even a slow inhalation of air. The poison arrow you shot the night before boomeranged its way into you.

The victim herself was handicapped from spinal problems yet she loved children so much loved teaching children so much that when she took this job it was one of the happiest days of her life. That was until HE took all that away. Who gave him that right? WHO GAVE HIM THAT RIGHT? What you deserve to be done to you shall never be done. Should you ever see the light of freedom there will be faces who will face you which may very well be the last faces you will ever see. Their eyes will pierce right through you. Plead for mercy, life or death but your fate will be decided in the time that it will take to be sealed.

You must stand in front of the survivors to answer why you killed her? It doesn’t matter why you did what you did but it does matter. There can be no acceptable reason or explanation for a man to want to kill as badly as you did. In your note, you so deftly carved into the flesh that you could not be stopped was an impassioned plea to end your worthless life. May your hands be covered in the rust from the metal bars on your cage. No day should ever pass that you have peace. Shattering a family as you forced a mother to bury her eldest daughter must have felt good. Rot in he—you f’ing bast—!

As the mother, father and the slain daughter are all reunited in heaven there is peace, love, and joy with them. Side by side all three lay down together. Tender words picked out in advance stand proudly touching all who see them. One day soon before a final September setting sun visitors will come to say hello. They will put stones on your headstones so that all who pass by will see and feel the love those who are carrying the names or the dreams forward will forever hold. One sole survivor yearns to be with you even as you live on in him.

He knew that day something was wrong without knowing something was wrong. When he arrived home to a crime scene it was nothing he could have prepared for. The details knocked him senseless. With his mother wailing from the couch in the living room with Puma on her lap and his father walking aimlessly around the house his sister crumbled into her bed next to the now forever empty bed the mentally unconscious brother in absentia of G-d he had not yet to know was left to understand what he could not learn. It only got worse from there. How one day do you drive your precious party vehicle directly behind a hearse carrying a wooden coffin containing his elder sister en route to the place she would be laid to rest. Those words those filthy disgusting words ran in front of his eyes as the coffin was lowered into the ground. Seemingly an entire police precinct was there hoping to catch a killer or be led to him. Could they have thought (yes they did) it was he who carried out this slaughter? Although he arrived late for work that morning it was confirmed he was as he always was.

Friday, October 12th, 1979. Sunday, July 25th, 2019. A man walked on the moon 10 years earlier. This family watched in awe on a huge projector sized screen in Rockefeller Center after seeing the play Hair. An 80-pound handicapped teacher who taught handicapped children by day while pursuing a Masters Degree in Education at night was cut down as her life was taking on new wings. It just wasn’t fair. IT JUST WASN’T FAIR! She did nothing to deserve what became of her. NOTHING! What good can ever come of something that should never have been but was? Suffering, guilt, anger, and shame.

Please forgive me. G-d please forgive me. Soon I hope to come to you again. Puma who was the Siamese cat with the big bright beautiful blue eyes that followed her home one day will be there as well.

If he is still alive let his death be agonizingly slow and painful. YOU PIECE OF SH–! I cannot and would not kill but if I could I would have killed you…WITHOUT HESITATION OR REMORSE. G-d please forgive this Yid. Please bring this Yid to his mishpocha.