A Surprising Discussion

A surprising discussion took place at the High School cafeteria during the meeting of the Manhasset High School senior parents. A sizable crowd was assembled to hear about the college application process, the seeming enormity of that task, and the stress of students and their parents that is associated with it. All this, the guidance counselors advised, will be exacerbated by the Sept. 11 "events."

The choice of that word was striking. Were they the same counselors who provided us materials prepared by psychologists and other experts in their field who counseled, without exception, that parents and other advisors needed to be direct with children in talking about trauma, and above all, not disguise or avoid truthful, honest and open discussion about difficult topics such as drug and alcohol abuse, loss, and death. What began as striking became to me disturbing, as the bland word "events" was repeated again and again by these counselors, and then Principal Stark. Less than two weeks after the massacre of over 6,000 innocents whose crime was nothing more than showing up for work on a Tuesday morning, the Manhasset High School counselors and its principal characterized the greatest loss of civilian life on our nation's soil as an event. The tragedy that created dozens of newly minted widows and fatherless children in our own community is now just an event. The collapse of a symbol of our financial strength and pre-eminence, the work place of 50,000 people stoking the country's economic engine, is a mere event. A strong westerly breeze brought the odor of death to the Manhasset community on the Thursday following the attack. I suppose this also, in the words of my children's guidance counselor, is simply an event.

The striking turned to the shocking when Principal Stark turned the discussion to the topic of the annual display of waste and excess known as the Senior Frolic. I was struck numb by the enormity of this exercise of bad taste. To be sure, the prom and the Frolic were scheduled agenda items for the meeting, but could not the discussion of these topics be deferred? Apparently not, because one member of the audience outdid the principal. She complained (in a near-threatening tone) that, if there were not more volunteers for the project, there might not be a Senior Frolic this year. Now that would be a tragedy.

William Cornachio