Some members of coach Dave Sanders’ family have a message for America: It’s time to end your 10-year fixation with Columbine.
“Let the Columbine shooting tragedy rest in peace with Dave and the students,” Sanders’ daughter Cindy Thirouin said Saturday in an interview in the library of Columbine High School. “It will help us get through the grieving process.”
Each anniversary, every frequent reference on TV reopens a wound for the loved ones of victims of the April 20, 1999, school massacre, Thirouin said.
After a decade of the news media endlessly dredging up the events of that day, America needs to let family members of the victims remember their son, daughter or dad the way they wish to, she said.
Thirouin’s 15-year-old daughter, Tiffany Strole, has a hard enough time holding back her emotions each day she goes to school.
Tiffany, who was 5 when her grandfather was killed, is a freshman at Columbine.
She is reminded of that awful day that she learned of his death by watching TV every time she walks down the hallway where he taught business classes.
Her first days at Columbine were the hardest.
“When I first stepped through the door, I had mixed emotions,” she said. “I cried, but I needed to do my best and get good grades for my grandpa.”
Her older brother Tyler transferred to another school after his freshman year at Columbine. Teachers identified him as Dave’s grandson, Thirouin said. Tyler wanted to go somewhere where he could be his own person, she said.
What Tiffany prefers to recall is the kind, bearded man who would playfully toss her on a bed at the count of three or hold a towel over his arm mimicking a waiter and take food orders. The waiter always got it wrong: worms stuck out of his sandwiches. Tiffany doesn’t need the gratuitous sad reminders.
“Everybody brings it up,” Tiffany said. “I wish they would just move on and forget about it. Move on and let it go so the family can move on and heal in their own way.”
Another of Sanders’ grandchildren, Mallory Sanders, 17, said she hopes that when people think of her grandfather they are left with positive thoughts.
“He died doing what he loved,” Sanders said. “He tried to save other students. He succeeded.”
Kirk Mitchell: 303-954-1206 or kmitchell@denverpost.com
