As a day camp counselor at the Sands Beach Club in the summer of 2009, I grew close to all the girls assigned to me, but especially to Kate Hance. She was five, the youngest in my group, and we immediately bonded. It was to me that Katie ran whenever she skinned her knee, or had some new secret to confide. She chattered incessantly, and was especially excited about starting kindergarten in September and finally attending the same school as her older sisters, Emma, age 9 and Alyson, age 7.
After three and a half weeks of camp, Kate was taken on a weekend camping trip with her sisters, Emma and Alyson, by their aunt, Diane Schuler. On Monday, Kate and her sisters weren't back in camp. I didn't think twice about it, figuring they must be tired from camping and they would be back Tuesday. Tuesday came and during the morning staff meeting, the camp director told us there had been a car accident over the weekend involving three campers. I felt myself grow cold.
Slowly, the camp director said in a voice filled with anguish and heartbreak, “Emma, Alyson…" Before she said “Kate," I let out a huge sob. I could not stop crying and eventually had to be escorted out of the staff meeting. When I got home that night, I was watching the news and I finally found out the story of the accident.
On Sunday, July 26, 2009, Diane Schuler drove the wrong way on the Taconic Parkway until her minivan carrying Kate, Alyson, Emma, and Diane's children, toddler Erin and son Bryan, crashed head on into a car carrying three people. Everyone died except for Bryan. Videos of the crash and photos of the three Hance girls brought fresh tears to my eyes. I did not want to have to wake up tomorrow and go to work. I did not want to see the confusion in my camper's eyes as they would ask me where Kate was and see me cry at the mention of her name, but I knew that I had to be there for them and help them understand what happened and make them know Kate was at peace.
Days passed after the funerals, and all people would talk about was '"the accident." The shock of a lifetime came when on July 29, The Daily News came out with the disturbing truth of the crash: toxicology reports stated Diane Schuler was drunk and high when she drove the wrong way on the Taconic Parkway. She had a blood alcohol content of .19, when the legal BAC for New York is .08. Traces of marijuana were found in her system, proving she smoked a large quantity 15 minutes to an hour before the crash. With this evidence, police ruled the crash a homicide.
Being in college, and the ages of 18-22, often, we think we are invincible. We are enjoying the “best four years" of our lives without a second thought. However, we are not invincible. No one is. There are hundreds of police reports so far this year regarding drunk driving, not just among college students but drivers in general. But with spring breaks occurring during the month of March, I am particularly concerned about students my age and drunk driving. It terrifies me when I go out to the bars in New Orleans, afraid when some tourist or spring breaker stumbles out of the bar holding their car keys.
Spring break is notorious for letting loose, having fun and not really having a care in the world, just sipping on margaritas or shotgunning beer. Judgments are impaired and things can sometimes can get out of hand. Some solutions that may seem obvious but still aren't taken advantage of are taking a taxi or Uber home or having a designated driver. When my friends and I want to go out and I know we will be drinking, we usually pool money together beforehand for a cab or one of us volunteers to drive. Usually, I do it and I am perfectly all right with that—I do not want to have to go to another funeral with another coffin and graveyard plot bought too soon.
Kate was only five years old when she died; she never had the chance to have a full, happy life. Her death made me rethink my own choices about my life. Knowing that each day could be my last, I now try even harder to make every day count. I live my life to the fullest, thinking that if I do happen to die suddenly, I would have done something in my life that I was proud of and that I would never regret. I still miss Katie, and remembering her often makes my eyes flood with tears, but I know that out of the ashes of this tragedy, I know Kate, Alyson and Emma are some of heaven's best angels.
