By When the president walked into the classroom, Lazaro Dubrocq and the
rest of the 7-year-old children in Mrs. Daniels' class at Booker
Elementary stood up to welcome him.
"Good Morning!" George W.
Bush said as the kids sat down to recite some reading exercises. "Get
ready!" Mrs. Daniels said. The children all answered as one. They were
ready. They had all been waiting for this day.
It was the morning of September 11, 2001.
Soon
it was time to read with the president. Lazaro and his friends all had a
book, "The Pet Goat," underneath their blue chairs. Lazaro reached down
for his book, then looked back up to see the face of the President. It
had changed. Something wasn't right. Lazaro could see it. Even as a 7
year old, he could see it.
He felt his heart race just a beat,
but he tried to focus on the book in his hands. He put his finger under
each word and read aloud. The president had come to his classroom in
Sarasota, Fla., to spend a few moments, and the boy figured the man
always looked busy.
But the look on his face didn't go away.
Lazaro Dubrocq. (Credit: Eric Adelson)Like
so many of us, Lazaro Dubrocq can relive that day in his mind as
vividly as any day of his life, only he relives it as someone who was
very much a part of the history that unfolded. He relives it as someone
who was close enough to see the creased lines in the face of a man who
would soon order the Air Force to prepare to shoot down commercial
airliners if necessary. He relives it as a child who was scared and
confused.
And today, 10 years later, he relives it as a high
school senior who has committed fully to a sport that requires the
utmost of emotional control.
The day started out with joy.
Dubrocq, the first American-born member of his family, was going to meet
the president of the United States. He saw the Secret Service and the
K-9 dogs outside his school, and didn't mind waiting to be inspected in
the hot Florida sun. Lazaro was wearing a clear plastic backpack, so the
nice officer waved him through with a smile. The boy got to his class
and his teacher, Mrs. Daniels, told him to please be on his best
behavior. The president walked in and introduced himself. He smiled. But
it wasn't long before another man arrived.
The man, Chief of
Staff Andrew Card, bent over to whisper in the president's ear. Of
course, little Lazaro had no idea who or what a chief of staff was. He
just watched the president start to look around the room, at the lights
and cameras in the back. "He seemed completely disconnected from what
was going on in the classroom," Lazaro recalls now. "He was not focused
at all."
Then President Bush left for a little while and came
back. He handed out some M&M candy to everyone and said goodbye. "I
had no idea what was going on," Lazaro says now. "I figured there was
political stuff going on." It was only later that Mrs. Daniels pushed a
television into the classroom and turned it on. The children saw the
pictures of two buildings on fire. "I thought we were watching an action
movie," Lazaro says. Mrs. Daniels tried to explain that terrorists had
stolen some planes.
Lazaro thought, "What's a terrorist?"
Fear
set in when it bubbled through the school that because President Bush
was nearby, Booker Elementary could be a target. Lazaro's mom, Maria,
picked him up and tried to explain what was going on. She spoke slowly
and clearly – this is what a terrorist does, this is what happened this
morning, this is why the President looked upset.
"He was so young," says Maria, "and we wanted to keep the day nice and fun instead of grieving and sorrowful."
The
TV trucks soon showed up at his house, though, and over the coming
weeks and months, Lazaro began to grasp just how horrible a tragedy
September 11 really was.
For years, his parents wondered how 9/11 would affect their little boy.
Credit: APLazaro
Dubrocq thinks about 9/11 every time he opens the refrigerator. Sitting
there in the door is the little box of M&Ms he got from the
president. It's the only memento he has from that day, so he protects
that candy as if it was an American flag. He wants to see that little
box. He wants to remember.
Sept. 11 comes up in history class at
Riverview High School in Sarasota – not just as a talking point, but as a
part of the curriculum. Dubrocq always raises his hand and tells the
class he was there that day. He tells the whole story. He wants everyone
to know.
"I like to bring it up," he says. "I'm proud to have read with the president."
To
Laz, which is what his friends call him now, it's an honor to be a part
of America at all. His father is Cuban and his grandfather is French.
His mother was born in Mexico and her father came from Spain. He speaks
with friends in English and family in Spanish. He wants to be the first
Dubrocq to graduate from an American college. Sept. 11, 2001 may be seen
as a sad detour in a great nation's story, but Laz wants more than ever
to be a part of the fabric of that story. He's a rare student who is
both in his school's international baccalaureate program and a top
varsity athlete. (He would be at Booker High now if he didn't choose the
accelerated program at Riverview High, 20 minutes away.) How many high
school seniors know what they want to do for a career? Laz says he wants
to get his college degree in engineering. And he wants to get it at the
site of the disaster of 9/11. He wants to study in New York City, at
Columbia University.
"I want to be a leader," he says. "I want to be someone who chooses what he wants and accomplishes it no matter what."
Laz
Dubrocq is sitting in the gym where his teammates are practicing. He's
wearing a gray, sweat-stained shirt with "Laz Dubrocq" on the back. He
doesn't mind all the media requests, nor does the pressure of talking on
camera or being photographed seem to bother him. He's done it a lot.
It's part of who he is now.
He gets up off the mat and takes his
stance, staring a teammate straight in the eye. It's only an early
practice – well before the season – but Laz doesn't do much joking
around. Between grappling sequences he occasionally barks out an order.
It's clear he's monitoring the others. He makes his coach, Jerett
Curtis, seem laid back.
"He's definitely a go-getter," Curtis said. "Definitely goal-driven. He takes life at the moment and doesn't waste his time."
Dubrocq
wasn't a great wrestler when he started here at Riverview as a
freshman. He was 115 pounds and hardly imposing. Curtis told him if he's
going to be serious about the sport, he needs to have the discipline to
put on weight. Four years later, Dubrocq is up to 150 pounds and a lot
of it is muscle. He's got a shot at states this year.
"He's a workhorse," Curtis said. "He's becoming a great wrestler."
The
sport can have a reputation for being brutal and unrefined, but it's
really the opposite – a mental and physical chess match that is as
emotionally demanding as any athletic activity. If you take a second
off, you might as well roll right over. This is not a sport for the
easily rattled.
"I always tell my wrestlers, this is the only
sport that will treat you like life will treat you," Curtis said.
"People will not be there to help you."
It's no coincidence that
both Laz's parents are trained ballet dancers and instructors.
Self-control is not just a bonus, it's mandatory. That's part of why
Maria, a stickler for academic performance, has let her oldest son try
the sport. "Wrestling," she says, "is one of the things that's made him
focus."
To his coach, Laz's choice of sport is proof that any emotional remnants of the trauma of 9/11 have dissipated.
"What happened to him can go either way," Curtis says. "It will spur you on or it will cripple you."
Laz
has not been crippled. Like the country he loves, he's only battled
harder because of what he went through. He gets a lot of questions about
whether wrestling is some outlet for his anger over the terrorist
attacks. Is he fighting his opponent or his demons? But that's not Laz
and that's not wrestling. Outbursts are wasteful in his sport. Laz
doesn't grapple with the image of Osama bin Laden in his mind. He only
concentrates on what he has to do next.
"I feel 9/11 has helped me mature," he says. "It gives me a sense of meaning."
He
was only seven when he saw worry in the president's eyes. But Laz
Dubrocq is now charged with representing a fragile day in his country's
history. And although he is the first in his family to be born American,
he will not let what happened 10 years ago keep him from writing a
truly American story.
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