A Mother's Reckoning: Living in the Aftermath of Tragedy(18)

Every channel ran graphic accounts of the carnage, and of the horrifying things Dylan and Eric had said and done. There were detailed descriptions of the weapons the boys had carried, and of the clothing they wore. There were diagrams of their movements through the school. In the absence of information, there was endless speculation as to the motives behind the attack.

Theories abounded, many of them conflicting, and each one of them more perplexing than the one before. The papers reported that Dylan and Eric had been goths. They’d been members of a death cult. They’d been sworn members of an antisocial clique at the school called the Trench Coat Mafia. They’d been spoiled, overindulged brats who were never taught the difference between right and wrong. They’d been gay. They had been bullied. They’d been bullies themselves. The attack had been cold-blooded, and planned for a long time. Alternatively, it had been impromptu: the boys had simply snapped.

Much has been written in the years since about the media coverage of the event—in particular about how quickly early misinformation about the boys solidified into received truth.

For me, listening to the flood of speculation felt like looking into a kaleidoscope. I was as hungry for enlightenment as anyone else; I had no idea anymore what to believe. As every new piece of information tumbled into place, each one uglier than the last, a different picture of my son came into focus. Invariably, that picture was of someone I did not recognize. When one of the component pieces was discounted, or determined to be false, the arrangement would shift again—and with it, the ground under my feet. To the rest of the world, these kaleidoscopic shifts probably made it seem like investigators and the press were closing in on a plausible explanation for why and how the tragedy had occurred. But each explanation took me further away from the boy I knew.

Early on, I flinched from the news coverage about Columbine because it was wildly inaccurate, or reporting things about my son I could not bear to hear. I now flinch because, as an antiviolence activist and brain health advocate, I understand how frighteningly irresponsible much of it was. We now know that press coverage with excessive details—fetishizing what the killers wore, for instance, or providing precise accounts of their movements during the crime—inspire copycats, and give them a blueprint upon which to model their own plans.

At the time, though, the contradictory reports and the inaccuracies served to fuel my desperate hope it was all a terrible misunderstanding. If they’d gotten this fact wrong, or that one, then perhaps all of it was false. As I would come to learn too well over the weeks, months, and years to follow, the mind plays tricks to hold itself together when under tremendous strain. Ordinarily logical to a fault, I spent those early days clinging to any shred of hope I could salvage or manufacture, no matter how irrational or far-fetched.

The first and most widely spread inaccuracy was the characterization of the boys as “outcasts.” This startled me, although it shouldn’t have: as I was to learn, it is a commonly held (and even more commonly reported) misconception about mass shooters.

It was true Dylan had always been reserved and self-conscious; he never liked to be the center of attention, or to stand out from the crowd in any way. It was also true he had grown more reserved as he entered adolescence, although he was never the ostracized, friendless, antisocial stereotype offered up by the media. Throughout his life, Dylan was quick to make and keep good, close friends, both girls and boys. During his high school years, our phone rang to the point of distraction with invitations to go bowling or to the movies, or to play fantasy baseball. If the media could be wrong about Dylan’s social status, my broken mind reasoned, there was still the possibility it was all wrong—that the reporters and police had their facts mixed up and Dylan was a victim, not the agent, of violence.

It was also reported that Eric had been Dylan’s only friend, which wasn’t remotely true. We’d frankly discouraged the relationship after the two of them had gotten in trouble together the previous year, and Tom and I had been pleased to notice Dylan keeping his distance. At the time of his death, I’d definitely have named Nate as Dylan’s closest friend.

Similarly, when the media identified Dylan and Eric as swastika-wearing haters, I felt strangely buoyed; there was simply no way this part of the reporting could be right. I had been raised in a Jewish home, and our own family had hosted an informal Passover seder two short weeks before. As the youngest, Dylan had read the Four Questions at the celebration. I had spent my career as a teacher and an advocate for people with disabilities, and Tom and I were both lifelong proponents of tolerance and inclusion. Neither of us would ever have tolerated any hate speech or anti-Semitic imagery in our home or on Dylan’s clothing.

Again and in the same vein, I focused obsessively on the contradictory and changing numbers—how many hurt, how many dead. If the authorities still weren’t sure about fatalities, what else might they be wrong about? Much as I was riveted to those tallies, I did not yet—could not—translate the numbers into what they really meant: children and a teacher who had been violently and permanently torn from their families and robbed of their lives, of their futures. I wanted the number of fatalities and injuries to be small, as if that would make Dylan’s actions seem less awful. I hope I do no dishonor to those who died and were injured or traumatized that day, or to their families, by being truthful about this. It would be weeks before the veil lifted and I would cry for Dylan’s victims. We all grieve first for the ones we love, and Dylan was my son. And I still didn’t believe he could really have killed anyone.