Potomac Almanac

Potomac — Alexander Murk and Calvin Jia-Xing Li were both 18, rear-seat passengers who died in the single car accident on Thursday evening, June 25.

“They were high-spirited young men; they were good students, all doing well, going off to college,” said Dr. Michael Doran, Wootton principal. “They were popular good-looking boys.”

Sunday’s vigil was the second vigil, with the first at Thomas Wootton High School on Friday.

“Students told stories that were touching, funny, hard to listen to,” Doran said. “But it was helpful for each of the kids to be there and hear those stories.”

Alexander Murk, Calvin Jia-Xing Li and Samuel Joseph Ellis, who was critically injured, all celebrated their graduation just weeks before on May 27 at DAR Constitution Hall.

Police continue to investigate the crash that occurred shortly before midnight on Thursday, June 25. Preliminary investigation indicated that the four young men in the car, a 2006 Acura TSX, had attended an underage drinking party in the area, according to police. Samuel Joseph Ellis was driving when they left the party, traveling west on Dufief Mill Road near Travilah Elementary when the car left the road, hitting several “fixed objects,” police said. Detectives of the Collision Reconstruction Unit are working with officers from the Alcohol Initiatives Section to investigate the events leading up to the collision, and say that they are investigating speed, alcohol and lack of seat belts as possible factors.

On Sunday night, more than 300 members of the Wootton High School community came to a vigil at the site of a crash that killed two young men who had just graduated.

Ellis was driving; Murk and Li were in the back seat and were “discovered deceased at the scene,” according to police reports.

The front seat passenger, who is not being identified due to the on-going investigation, was taken to an area hospital with non-life-threatening but serious injuries.

“At the hospital, I saw the parents of two sets of kids who are going to live, and two sets of parents who are preparing to bury their children,” said Doran.

While school is out of session for the summer, Wootton is open and counselors are available for students, graduates and family members who can drop in.

“We’re here for the kids, they know that,” Doran said. “Young people going through their stages of grief, but for many this is really the first the person who has been close to them who has died. … Everyone is working through it in their own different way.”

Doran also noted the dangers of the passage from high school graduation until the beginning of college.

“It’s a dangerous time for these kids. They think they are invincible. There’s lots of data out there that says that it’s a really scary time between those two milestones, between graduating and starting college. They are mobile, they’ve got friends, they take risks. … They have momentary lapses of good decision-making.”

Murk was set to attend Penn State; Li would have attended the University of Maryland.

• Alexander Murk, beloved son of David W. Murk, Capt., USCG (Ret.) and Pamela Murk. Brother of Benjamin Douglas Murk and Cameron Arthur Murk. Grandson of Douglas and LuEllen Robertson and Margery Pittsinger Murk and the late Arthur Murk. Nephew of Karen Virginia Murk, Stephen Arthur Murk and Amy Jennifer Murk. Friends will be received at Pumphrey’s Bethesda-Chevy Chase Funeral Home, 7557 Wisconsin Avenue, Bethesda, on Wednesday, July 1, from 3 to 5 and 7 to 9 p.m. In lieu of flowers memorial contributions may be made to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, 1311 Mamaroneck Ave., White Plains, NY 10605. See more at: http://www.pumphreyfuneralhome.com/obituary/Alexander-William-Murk/Potomac-MD/1522743#sthash.456na1wN.dpuf
• Hines-Rinaldi Funeral Home, 11800 New Hampshire Ave., Silver Spring is in charge of arrangements for Calvin Jia-Xing Li. Details have not been available by Almanac’s deadline. See http://obits.dignitymemorial.com/dignity-memorial/obituary.aspx?n=Calvin-Li&lc=9738&pid=175185924&uuid=2826730b-16b9-4d36-afd9-176036b59104

‘I Have Words’

By Evva Starr

Newspaper/Yearbook Advisor, Wootton High School

From Evva Starr’s blog:

Two nights ago a car accident took the lives of two young men in the Wootton High School community. Yesterday I was with a group of their friends, who asked me for words of comfort. I had none to give. All I could do was sit with them in their pain, and share it.

Today I have words.

First, you will not always hurt as painfully as you do today. Eventually your stomach will unclench and your chest will expand fully and your head will stop pounding. Eventually you will think of Alex and Calvin and you will feel sunny inside. Be patient with yourself in the meantime. Do what people tell you — eat, drink water, exercise, sleep, be with the people you love.

Feeling less physical pain doesn’t mean you will ever miss them less. You will never stop missing them. You will see their shadows at every place you used to go together, at every gathering of friends, at your reunions and weddings. It will seem impossible that they aren’t there, because it is. Don’t be afraid of those shadows: welcome them. Say out loud that you miss them, five, 10, 20 years from now. Others will be grateful you have voiced what they are all thinking.

Second, do not turn blame inward or outward. You think you know many of the factors that went into the accident. Some you might know, others you will never know. Spending any amount of time trying to go back and find the moment you could have changed things is worthless. Not one thing you did or could have done would have altered the events of that night. It happened, it’s over. If you blame yourselves or each other, you will fall apart. You need each other. Fall together.

Third, Alex and Calvin are not a lesson or a warning. Their lives were about so much more than that. Their deaths do not define them. The 18 plus years they lived define them. The families who loved them, their friends, the things they said and did, the futures they lost — all of that makes up the young men they were. Do not reduce them to a cautionary tale or a statistic, the way the media has. Don’t diminish the brilliant sparks of light Alex and Calvin were by simplifying them. They were complex human beings; keep them that way.

Try not to be frustrated or maybe even enraged when you see others professing grief you feel is less justified than your own. People are shown on the news crying or quoted in the media or show up sobbing at a vigil or funeral and you see them and think, “They didn’t know him like I did. She should just stop.” Alex and Calvin touched hundreds of people’s lives. It is a testament to them that so many people mourn them so much. Grief sets off older losses as well. Someone might be remembering a brother who died in similar circumstances 20 years ago. Or a grandfather who died last month. Or maybe they are empathetically suffering the pain of others. If it really upsets you, just look away, but try as hard as you can not to judge.

Finally, know that those two beautiful young men were made of stardust, held together by electricity and gravity, just as each of us are. Stardust, like all matter, can never be destroyed. They will be with you, for the rest of your lives. All you must do to summon them is to think of them.

Evva Starr is the newspaper and yearbook adviser at Thomas S. Wootton High School, and she writes a blog called “After Deadline.” This post is titled: “I Have Words.” Starr gave permission for the Potomac Almanac to quote from it. http://evvastarr.com/1/post/2015/06/i-have-words.html