Life Lost Too Soon

This weekend, the community of West Orange-Stark lost a remarkable young man. His name was Reggie Garrett. Reggie was a senior starting quarterback for the WOS Mustangs. He was, from all accounts, not just a remarkable athlete but also a remarkable student and young man. Reggie was taken from us after he threw a touchdown during the 2nd quarter of the football game Friday night. He threw the pass, walked to the sideline and collapsed. A community is in mourning. A family has lost a son. And all too soon. As a community, we are coming together during this time of loss; but I feel that this support will not last too long.

I live in a community that lives behind invisible lines. Lines that are drawn around ethnicity and economic status. Lines that keep our community from truly being one. You see it at the high school football games. You see it at the parades. You see it all over this area. Towns that have a reputation of being discriminitory. Schools that have a reputation for being exclusive to one group or another. It takes a tragedy for us to come together, and when the grieving is over everyone goes back to the way things were. That is unacceptable to me.

We are seeing an emergence of the Lamar football program and there is a lot of support. But if the community doesn't come together to support the team we will be right back where we were 21 years ago. If Lamar doesn't address issues with parking and water and ice at the games, and even things such as trash cans in the stadium we are going to see petty people use these things as reasons not to support the Cardinals. And that is a shame.

I sit at the new stadium here in town and listen to constant criticism. Now, I am not blameless, but at least I see that things can and will be better for this complex being here. Yes, there have been technical difficulties with the scoreboard. Yes, the sound system didn't work too well during the national anthem last night. But those are things that can be corrected. The stadium has been opened for use for 3 weeks. Let's see what needs to be fixed and give them time to get everything fixed instead of constantly criticizing.

This community needs to come together at all times. It is time to be one.