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My Joshua...I Miss You :(
by Blanca E. Arredondo, Corpus Christi, TX, U.S.A.

The night before we were all at the hospital, my daughter was in labor. I sent my son Joshua home, so he could go to school the next morning. My grandson was born the next morning at quarter til 10pm and my son's death accurred less than an hour later.

I still remember every single minute of that day. I was in shock for weeks aferwards even after returning to work I could not seem to find myself....people would laugh and I would think to myself, how can people laugh and my son is gone, my only son, my beautiful, handsome, tall, wonderful son is dead!!! And these people are laughing and joking around....What is wrong with them.....

I clock out to go home and no, I don't want to go home, I love my two daughters, my granddaughter, and my grandson, but that house is just too depressing for me.

When I arrived to the house the police had it all blocked off for blocks, I ran as fast as I could and then I felt as though my feet weighed so much, and I couldn't run, I felt as if I was moving in slow motion, then I saw the look of dispair and terrible, awful, pain in the eyes of my sister and niece, whom I had called to meet me at the house.

(You see on the way to my van after leaving my daughter and grandson safe and sound at the hospital I began to get phone calls for me to get home, when one of my neighbors called I didn't know what to think, why would my neighbor call me and tell me to get home)

So I called my sister immmediately to meet me at my house, I ran every stop sign, every red light was like a stop sign to me, forget about following the speed limit. Later they told me that they heard me coming minutes before I arrived with my tires screetching at every turn.

The officer in charge told me that a teenaged boy was found in my son's room dead with a gun shot to the face and that another 15 year old boy went to his home, threw a gun at his 12 year old brother and told him "Joshua is dead, call the cops" and he (Daniel) took off running.

I went thru the motions, people hugged me, gave their condolensces, etc. but all I felt was anger, hate, confusion, total misery, numb, so cold.

The other teen was found the next day and informed the police that they were playing a form of Russian Roulette. He claims that Joshua had the gun for days, that Joshua found the bullets, he pretty much put it all on my son, because he was already in so much trouble with his probation officer, etc. and so they closed the case a week later when the M.E. ruled the death a suicide.

I still don't believe that. I am still in denial. I feel that that boy had something to do with the death of my son. I have letters that he wrote to my daughter stating that he wished he hadn't skipped school that day with Joshua, then they wouldn't have gone to his house and taken the gun to my house and then Joshua would be alive....
But I don't dwell on that, Daniel got one year at a Texas Youth Detention Center....as for the so called gang members that refused to leave my son alone, who I continually kicked out of my home, who I called the police and reported them trespassing when found on my property, 4 months later 4 teenage boys are going to be tried as adults in the murder of a man at the local movie theatre.

When I see the news reports, read the newspaper articles, I can hear my son's name also mentioned, I can read my son's name and age as the 5th teenage boy facing 15 years to life in prison. I cannot Thank God enough for taking my son where I know he is at peace and happy and suffering any more. I tell myself each and every day that Joshua just couldn't survive his teen years. The insecurities that come with a child of a single parent home, the lack of a male role model, the pressures of drugs and alcohol, the lack of any programs that deal with prevention. The local juvenile center wouldn't help me because my son had no record.

I Miss my son soooo much, I cannot wait to see him again and I want everyone to know that my son lived a good 15 years before he was taken from me. And he loved us and he knew that we all loved him very much.

I miss his smile, his laughter, his jokes, his love for music, baseball, swimming, football, he was so talented and such a sports fan, he played baseball since he was 4 1/2 years old, he played football, was on the swim team at the local rec center, he was in guitar class, he was everything.


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