Tyrone

I was walking in the cemetery across from the monastery, and I saw someone at the grave of “Tyrone.”  I stopped to talk with him.  He was placing a balloon and flowers on his grandma’s grave.  I asked if he knew Tyrone who is buried next to her.  “DuJuan” said Tyrone was his younger cousin.  Tyrone died at the age of 16, and his photo is etched into the head stone.  I asked how he died saying that I pray for him and his family as I pass by his grave daily.  DuJuan told me that Tyrone had been an A student and had won a poetry contest.  He was a fine young man, but he was hanging out with friends near an apartment where a robbery had occurred.  The man whose apt had been robbed presumed that they were the robbers, so he came after them.  They ran, except for Tyrone.  He didn’t run since he had done nothing.  The man forced him at gun point to lie face down and then shot him in the back of his head.

My heart sank as I heard the account.  DuJuan was interested in why I chose him to pray for, and I told him that I’d seen the photo and walked over to look at his picture and was taken by his young age.  We talked for a while as DuJuan told me about his work with youth and his desire to help others.  I was encouraged by him and now when I walk past Tyrone’s grave, I will have a whole new appreciation for the short life of this young man.  May God bless his family and all those who fall in the face of violence in our city.