Bad Deja Vu

On Friday, November 1, 1991, I was living in Iowa City, IA, working at my first official post-college Architecture job.

Earlier that morning, a friend of mine & I had attempted to drive up to Fargo with plans of seeing the Gear Daddies perform, but after driving for less that an hour, we realized that the ice storm that had been slowly making its way across Iowa was insurmountable. We headed back. And we went back to work.

Sometime after 3:00, the mid-afternoon doldrums set in, and I left the office and scurried across the pedestrian mall to a nearby coffee shop for an infusion of caffeine. Now, anyone who knows Iowa City knows that the downtown and the University of Iowa blend together, blurring all distinction between University and City. In fact, just 1 block away from the coffee shop where I was eagerly watching a barista make my nonfat triple shot mocha, was a cluster of University buildings that I walked by nearly every day on my way to work. Lecture halls, I think they were. I couldn't be sure, since my view of Iowa City was from the eyes of a (first-time) young professional taxpayer, and not a student.

Anyway, after pausing for awhile to chat with a coworker who was also tending to his mid-afternoon work lull, I decided to make my way, jacket-less, across the cold, windy pedestrian mall back to the office. I moved quickly, cradling what was left of my warm coffee between my cold hands. But things outside seemed different. There was almost no one around, and there were police sirens in the distance. The tension in the air was palpable, and something seemed, well, awry. I spun around, and ended up facing the direction of the university buildings. Through the tiny snowflakes that had just began to swirl crazily around, I could see a couple of people, also coatless, running to the west. Perhaps they too were also going to get some coffee. Then I scurried back into the warmth of my office.

An hour or so later we found out. At around 3:30, Gang Lu, a U of I graduate student, had shot six people not two blocks from our office. Four of the victims were professors & administrators with whom Lu had grievances, one was a fellow PhD student, and one was a young secretary in the office of academic affairs. Five of the six died, and the lone survivor (the secretary) was rendered a quadriplegic. Then Lu turned the gun on himself.

I just wish, since Lu was obviously planning on killing himself anyway, he could have done that part first.