Remembering the friend I lost to gun violence 30 years ago

This weekend, I joined thousands of people across the Bay Area and the nation in wearing orange to remember the lives lost to gun violence and the families that bear that grief of loved ones forever gone. For the first time in my life, I walked across the Golden Gate Bridge (a sad fact considering I'm a lifelong Bay Area resident), as part of the annual bridge march marking Gun Violence Awareness Day.

My inspiration for immersing myself in the movement to combat gun violence in recent months largely stems from the example of the Parkland, Florida, students in the wake of the mass shooting at their school, and my disgust at seeing so many lives destroyed by this epidemic and so many children who now live in fear because of it. As a parent, I'm continually haunted by what happened at Sandy Hook Elementary School to 20 first-graders in 2012, and the grief their families -- and so many others since -- must live with each day of their lives.

But as I walked across the world's most famous bridge on Saturday and took in one of the most beautiful vistas on earth, my mind turned squarely to the classmate and friend I lost to gun violence in 1989.

The Pinole Valley High School Class of '89 will always be haunted by the tragedy that took Danton Dibble from us near the end of our senior year. He was one of the most popular, easy-going and personable members of our class, and the last person you would have thought might fall victim to a fatal bullet.

The details of what happened are a bit foggy all these years later. What I do recall is that Danton died because he was simply at the wrong place and the wrong time when he encountered a drunk teen who had gotten his hands on a rifle that he should never have had access to. Danton and some of his friends were hanging out one evening in a nearby regional park when the student with the rifle came across them and began indiscrimately firing shots into the air. One bullet struck Danton in the head. Despite the heroic efforts of his friends to rush him to the hospital, he died.

Danton and I weren't close friends. I was naturally shy and a loner who never fully conquered my social phobias as a teenager (in case my fellow classmates wonder why they rarely if ever saw me at parties or dances, now you know). But I was fortunate enough to get to know many students casually through my involvement on the school newspaper and speech and debate teams, and Danton was among them. I recall us taking typing class together our senior year (yes, they once taught typing in high school with actual typewriters). He was a natural jokester who always seemed to have a sly remark on the tip of his tongue for any occasion and always seemed to have a smile on his face. I recall that when we came across one another in the quad during lunch, we would stop and chat for a few moments. Like most of the classmates I knew in high school, Danton was much more popular than I, and had many more opportunities for social interaction, so the fact he took an interest in me always meant a lot. I recall that, like me, he had deeper interests in politics and the larger world, even at our young ages, and our discussions would sometimes turn to the weighty issues of the day (I regret to say that back in those days, I was a George H.W. Bush Republican).

During my senior year, I was fortunate to land a part-time gig as a sports "stringer" for my local newspaper. I was writing up a basketball game story in the newsroom the night my editor asked me if I knew of a Danton Dibble and told me what had happened. All I remember feeling at that moment and in the days that followed was a numbness. It was hard to come to grips with the emotions of losing a fellow student, a teenager who, like me, had his entire life ahead of him. And so, I didn't try. I left the grief and emotional reckoning to those who knew him better than I did. I stoically wrote the story for the school newspaper, took part in some brief conversations with classmates and teachers, tried to offer what little consolation I could to his twin sister (another popular member of our class) and then rarely said another word about it. I retreated back into my emotional and social cocoon.

A few months later, I graduated along with the rest of the Class of '89 and we went our separate ways. I lost touch with nearly everyone I went to high school with until the power of Facebook brought many of us back together decades later. In the years that followed, Danton's memory would sometimes enter my thoughts, and I would think about where his life might have taken him. And I would sometimes glance at the page in our school yearbook that paid tribute to him. It included the following quote attributed to him that seemed to perfectly capture my relationship with him and the mutual affection we felt:
"To all those who paths I've crossed but never followed...I still love you."

We will always love you too, Danton. And we will never forget you or the thousands of others lost to gun violence.