Whose lives matter? | Columnists

I was absent last week, readers, and I apologize, but I have a reason. The rampant crime in America came home to my family. My grandson Austin Turner became a statistic when he was assaulted in Nashville on Feb. 18. His skull was fractured, and he suffered a major stroke, which put him in a coma. He turned 26 on March 2, clinging to life in the trauma ward at Vanderbilt Medical Center until all our prayers to Heaven and hopes that medical science would save his life proved futile. My daughter and his father finally accepted there was no longer a chance and made the agonizing decision to let him go, and on March 7, he passed out of this world. I’ve just returned home after laying him to rest.

If any good came from this, it affirmed the value all our lives have and how our brief earthly existence matters. Maybe not in profound, world-changing ways or getting-a-statue ways, but in the things that weigh on the scale of family and friends. I wish I’d known Austin better. He was my step-grandson and came into my life when my daughter married his dad.

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