The morning of November 18, we had crawled into our beds and lay there talking for about an hour when we decided we were finally tired. I remember looking at the clock and telling her the time...it was 2:42..there was no significance in those numbers in that particular moment...it was just late, and we had to get up early (early to a college student anyway).
A few hours after we had drifted off to sleep, our phone started ringing. It was my mom. She told me she was just calling to make sure we were okay. I told her we were fine and asked what was going on. That's when I found out that the bonfire had collapsed and emergency crews were on the scene. I hung up, told Kelly what my mom had said, and crawled back into bed. Nothing was really registering at the moment, and the severity of the situation was lost between the lack of sleep and the lack of information we had at that moment. As minutes ticked on, I finally asked Kelly if she was still awake, she said yeah, so we got up and turned on the TV. In that moment, things began to come into focus: the gravity of what had happened, the loss of life that would occur, and the lasting impact that the entire event would have on each Aggie.
Images are burned into my mind from that day. Walking out to stack and seeing the gnarled, splintered wood. The picture on the front page of The Battalion that would never be printed again, which showed a student pointing out where other students were located. That student did not survive. His body was twisted in half, but his efforts saved others' lives. The Aggie rings were left at the flagpole, with the knowledge that they would be safe and no one would dare steal them. The makeshift memorials of flowers, signs, pots, and other items became symbols of mourning. The boys covered in dirt and grime as they lifted and disassembled the heavy logs that seemed to resemble a child's game of pick-up sticks instead of a mighty bonfire.
As weird as it may sound, I cherish the fact that I was on campus the year Bonfire fell. It was a defining moment in Aggie's life and an experience that is still difficult to explain. It was one of those moments, though, like September 11. A moment that you wish never had to happen, but because it did, you're proud to be a part of something powerful and amazing that resulted after the fact. The Aggie community has always been considered very tight-knit, but at that moment in A&M history, we were one - one mind, one body, one spirit.
From the Aggie rings left at the flagpole for the fallen students who would now never get theirs, to the students covered in dirt and grim from moving the heavy logs, to the tear-streaked faces of each person knelt in prayer circling the site...it was the most emotional 24 hours that I've ever directly been a part of.
When we heard the 12th student had passed away, something in each of us knew that we wouldn't lose another. The remaining injured students would live...they had to.
Fifteen years have passed, but I recall the day's details like they were yesterday. I will never forget. "Here"
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