Sad, Sad day in Hoover Yesterday

(written on Tuesday):

Yesterday was not a good day at all. One of T's good friends from the dance studio was killed Monday morning in a HORRIBLE car crash. T & Natalie have been dancing together about 4 or 5 years now.

There are still some missing pieces to the story and a lot of rumors and speculation but somehow Natalie and a friend were out driving in the early morning hours, lost control of the car and hit a telephone pole. Natalie was pronounced dead at the scene and Sydney was found outside the vehicle. She is at the hospital with burns but they do not think her injuries are life threatening. To make matters worse, Sydney’s dad is in the fire department and was one of the first responders. Natalie was only 15 and Sydney, the driver, was 16. Both girls were sophomores.

The accident happened about a mile from the hotel so I passed by the scene on my way in Monday morning and mentioned it to some of the folks in my office. Cosmo & T were at the Ft. Myers airport coming home from a lax tournament and she was getting tweets about some Hoover girls in an accident but didn’t have any names. Someone at the hotel has some connections and made a couple of discreet phone calls. He told me the two girls names but not to say anything because it wasn't official. Recognizing Natalie's name, I instantly called my husband and told him what I had heard. I thought he had told T. Instead, he was “preparing” her and told her it doesn’t sound good. T called me from the airport and said, “Mom everyone’s saying it was Natalie.” I told her yes and thought she understood that Natalie had passed away. She was under the impression Natalie was still alive and called Ms. Shannon @ the studio. Ms. Shannon was the one who told her the bad news and T basically collapsed to the floor in the middle of the airport. It was bad. She was inconsolable. She was a total mess. I actually told Cosmo to buy a nip of brandy on the plane to calm her down a bit. She was that bad. Some sweet little old black lady whipped out an entire roll of paper towels and held T's hand and let T sob all over her.

T got off the plane in Bham and went straight to the studio. Ms. Shannon, the dance teacher, opened the studio for the girls last night and there were a lot of tears but also some nice memories of Natalie. It was very, very sweet to see the girls from all different area schools come together in honor of Natalie. They wrote letters to Natalie's parents to let them know how special Natalie was. Every parent, every teacher, every friend who has posted something about Natalie on Facebook has commented on how sweet she was, how she always had a smile on her face and was a generally happy-go-lucky young lady. T said she had never heard Natalie say a bad word about anyone.

I just keep thinking of Natalie’s mother. She sent her daughter to a sleep-over, never in a million years thinking she’d never see her daughter again. I guarantee you, last night every parent in Hoover had a talk with their kids: “Do you see why I’m So tough on you? Do you understand why I ask you to call me when you get there?" I know we did.