Finneran: Remembering Trooper Clardy

Friday, March 25, 2016

Tom Finneran, GoLocalWorcester MINDSETTER™

PHOTO: Massachusetts State Police

The house is a little quieter now with their Dad gone. The kids are quieter too. There’s no known or easy way to handle the loss of your father so the kids draw in a little bit.

They see their Mom, so sad and so alone and they don’t want to bother her. But she sees their eyes and hears their sobs and she knows that they need her near. They need her to hold them. They need her shoulders to cry upon. And she needs them, particularly when their bodies shake with the grief of a frightened and lonely child. She will hold them together in the name of their father.

His name was Tom Clardy. He was a Massachusetts State Trooper. He was killed last week while working, serving and protecting me and you.

News of his death hit like a thunderbolt. Alive and well one minute, gone the next minute in a horrific and senseless crash.

Such a sadness washes over me, a heavy unshakeable sadness. In some ways I’d like it to be gone but in other more important ways it’s good that it is so unshakeable. It makes one think………and wonder………and appreciate……….and pray.

I know that I am not alone in these thoughts. Thousands and thousands of fellow officers are staggered back a step or two by such a grim reminder of fleeting life and sudden death. So are their spouses. They think………and wonder………and worry………and pray.

Beyond the public safety community, hundreds of thousands of ordinary citizens have a sense of loss which feels awfully personal. In some ways their sadness is Trooper Clardy’s first headstone, erected immediately when word flashed over the airwaves. We build these private headstones, these monuments from our minds. They are not monuments which spring from personal memories for very few of us ever met Trooper Clardy. Rather, these monuments spring from empathy, from human kindness and deep respect. There but for the grace of God goes any one of us, suddenly gone, leaving holes that our families cannot fill.

I think of Mrs. Clardy and I cry. I think of Mrs. Clardy and I pray. I pray for her and I pray for her children. I can imagine their pain. I can imagine their confusion. I can imagine their unspeakable sadness. And I can imagine the eerie haunting quiet of their home.

Dad no longer wrestles with the kids. Or gives out assignments. Or checks on homework. Or does the dishes. Or hugs his bride…………Dad is gone.

Yes, the house is quieter now. The gravesite is quiet too. As it should be. Wet with tears, the ground hears the widow’s whispered words…………I love you. I miss you. And thank you. Please watch over us.

Godspeed Trooper Clardy. Thank you.

Tom Finneran is the former Speaker of the Massachusetts House of Representatives, served as the head the Massachusetts Biotechnology Council, and was a longstanding radio voice in Boston radio.