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Amy Kathleen Hicks
"I sing the body electric,
The armies of those I love engirth me and I engirth them.
They will not let me off till I go with them, respond to them,
And discorrupt them and charge them full with the charge of the soul."
I Sing the Body Electric
Walt Whitman, 1900
For My Heart Is Pressed Up Against The Glass
by Brian Hicks, Amy's brother
Some call it survivor's guilt, I call it 'what if?' May 21st, 1976 changed my life, and this is my side of the story. First a small amount of background to set the stage. Being the youngest of three and being picked on constantly by my brother and his friends left me with very little to look up to. My sister Amy filled that void. She was always there for me even when I did the stupid stuff that kids do. My parents divorced when I was 4 years old and mom remarried and we moved to California from Oregon. I never was close to my real dad and especially to my step dad. I took his name because it was easier than trying to explain why my name was different from my mom's.
Amy really introduced me to music and the theater. She played the oboe and clarinet and sang in the choir. In high school, she also was a member of the marching band and loved every minute of it.
When I started high school, Amy was a senior and was planning to become a lab technician. She was semi-engaged to her high school sweetheart, Tom (Seth) Roseborough and was looking forward to all that life could show her. Of course, that would never come to pass.
I was a member of the men's choir and was given the opportunity to join the A'Capella choir as the men's program was closing due to lack of interest (we only had 6 members and it wasn't worth keeping it open). For some reason, I chose not <br soft>to join the choir but took a physical education class instead... hence, what if?
Having been around the music department for a while, I probably knew most if not all the members of the choirs. My music career started in the 7th grade with the performing arts teacher, Christina Estabrook, who's husband, Dean, was the choir director at the high school. Sadly, Chris also lost her life in the tragedy that would change all our young lives.
I remember the day it happened and wonder if something would have changed if I had just said something about the bus that came to pick up the choir that day. It looked very old and beat up, and I mentioned this to my friends. I won't dwell on that because it probably would not have made a difference.
I remember telling Amy that I hoped she and Tom would have fun. I also remember joking with a few others about when we performed in the musical play 'Oliver' at Gray Avenue School. That was the last time I saw Amy alive and I still miss her guidance to this day.
My brother and I were in our classes when we were called out to meet with my mother's boyfriend and told we needed to go home right away. My brother asked me if I had anything stashed in my room that should not be there (use your imagination on that one).
When we arrived home, my mother was in tears and told us that the bus had been in an accident and there was no news of how bad it was, my brother slammed his fist into the wall and I just went numb, I wanted to go back to school, that was all I could think of.
I never did go back to school that day and, in hindsight, it was good that I didn't as much was happening between the news media shoving cameras into peoples' faces and the reports of the accident coming in slowly. I was OK until I saw a news shot of the bus upside down and covered bodies lying all around.
I remember thinking, 'Which of those bodies is my sister?' Even though no official word of her dying had come, I think I knew I would never see her again. Then I remembered that Amy was not the only person I knew on that bus and absolute grief hit me like a truck.
I have spoken to a few people who were there and survived and I am grateful that they did so that they can tell us their own stories. I know that this story is about my feelings and memories but it is also about lives cut short for no real reason other than someone really screwed up and didn't do what was necessary.
I will always remember those who we lost, Amy in particular as she was my sister and I loved her with all my heart as only a brother can.
Amy was a smart, bright, happy, loving, giving, caring person who would have made a big difference in this world if she wasn't taken as she was, but that's my vision and my story.
- Brian Hicks: July 22, 2008
(Amy's younger brother & a brother that any older sister would be proud to have, even if he ended up in the backseat of the car where she was sitting in the front seat and smooching with her boyfriend.)
(Some people have all the luck and Amy had Brian for a brother; see, this is the difference between Brian Hicks and yours truly... in a game of Catch 22, I'd go bust before 21!)
- Tom Randolph
"Tiger, tiger burning bright In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
In what distant deeps or skies Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire? What the hand dare seize the fire?
And what shoulder and what art Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And, when thy heart began to beat, What dread hand and what dread feet?"
What the hammer? what the chain? In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? what dread grasp Dare its deadly terrors clasp?
When the stars threw down their spears And water'd heaven with their tears,
Did he smile His work to see? Did He who made the lamb, make thee?
Tiger, tiger burning bright In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye Dare frame thy fearful symmetry."
The Tiger
"Songs of Experience"
- William Blake, 1794