Before & After

Of the day before, I remember two things. There were two busloads of noisy kids, including my daughter and many of her classmates, several of whom I knew. And at the campfire that night, some of the boys sang a popular Green Day song, accompanied on guitar by one of their teachers. Although I was nearing the end of my time at a job that was no longer making me happy, I'm reasonably sure I was in a good mood that day. It was fall - my favorite season in New Jersey - and I would be at a school camp with my daughter and her friends for two days.

About an hour before, we were all in the mess hall. Among the group of kids I was assigned to help supervise on the first activity of the day - rope climbing - was a boy who'd been to my home several times, including over the previous summer to swim in our pool. I remember laughing while asking him at breakfast about the white stuff under his eyes. He said something about his mother telling him to wear plenty of sun block and began smoothing the clotted patches into his face.

On the anniversary a year later, my daughter and her girlfriends gathered to visit his grave. The website his Father had established had stopped getting much traffic. I remember that made the girls sad. I'm pretty sure my wife and I spoke of his parents, as we had many times over that year. I think we posted a message on the website that day.