A personal note

Apologies to those of you here for witty banter and sports talk, but I'd like to get something somewhat serious off my chest.

Eric Rudolph was sentenced today to 4 consecutive life sentences for his bombing of Centennial Olympic Park here in Atlanta. He was sentenced last month to two consecutive life sentences for bombing a women's' clinic in Birmingham. Because parole doesn't exist in federal penitentiaries, barring a presidential pardon, Rudolph will never take another step as a free man.

And I am very glad.

In the summer of 1996 I was a rising sophomore at UGA, and I worked during the Olympics at the Swatch pavilion in Centennial Olympic Park. The Swatch pavilion was a sort of museum/kitschy watch store/event facility situated to the right of the main stage in the park. I served as a tour guide or host. Basically, I stood at the door and let people in in groups the museum part could handle. Upstairs there was a VIP area and we'd let athletes and celebrities come in the back door and eat and drink and watch the bands that would perform on the stage each night. I wore a Gold Medal from one of the Dutch men's' volleyball team. I met Mark Spitz and Peter Fonda. I almost spilled rioja on the matriarch of the ruling family of Spain. It was a good place to work. A lot was going on down there. I saw terrible bands, met people from all over, went to events at the World Congress Center across the park.

Then, on the middle weekend of the Olympics, things got crazy. The park was about 5 times more crowded than any other night of the games. Across the main lawn from our building was the Budweiser pavilion ("Bud World") and it was hilariously packed. All the staffmembers commented on how crazy things were that night. After the main bands (like Santana and shit like that), every night a band called Jack Mack and the Heart Attack would play songs for the 40+ set and then the park would close. I remember thinking that I couldn't wait for the park to close.

The staff at the Swatch pavilion had 7 or 8 positions we'd stand at. 3 or 4 of them were inside, one was at the front door that faced the Bud pavilion. And 2 were at the exit, which was right next to the Swatch store. About 10 yards in front of the exit was a large sound tower, at the base of which Eric Rudolph placed a large bag full of jagged metal and a detonation device.

If you remember any of the footage that was run on a loop on news programs right after the bombing, one of the best shots of the actual bombing was an interview with Janet Evans, the swimmer. She was doing an interview upstairs in the Swatch pavilion in front of the big window that faced the stage when the bomb went off shaking the building and causing loud crashing inside. I let her in the front door about 15 minutes beforehand.

When I let her in and when the bomb went off, I was stationed at the front door. The shape of the building jutted out and kind of blocked the view of the stage and the building was between me and the sound tower. This was lucky, I believe.

When the bomb went off, the concussion knocked me back a foot. I kind of staggered for a second and then wondered just what the hell it was. It sounded like an enormous speaker had exploded, but it didn't feel like that. I ran about 15 yards away from the building, to be able to see the stage. On the huge screens that were on either side of the stage I saw Jack Mack freaking out. It was clear that it wasn't just a blown speaker. Then I turned back to the Swatch building. Before I could walk back, a soldier, in full uniform, came running at me, yelling for me to get down. I did so quickly.

After about a minute or two on the ground, with panicked revelers running all over the place, I got up and walked quickly out of the park. Luckily, the Swatch company made us wear these ridiculous red and white striped polo shirts, so it was easy to spot my co-workers. It was also a little startling. Two of my coworkers were stationed at the exit of the building. I had rotated away from that position about 30 minutes earlier. Both of them had blood all over their shirts. One had been cut by some of the shrapnel, slightly. The other had run into other people who had been injured very badly by the bomb. It was a lot of blood. They were very shaken. We all were, I guess. But they were almost catatonic.

Security personnel kept yelling to get out of the area, since there were fears that the bomb was only an initial barrage, in order to get the innocent civilians out of the park, then a bigger one would detonate with only security personnel inside. We weren't moving much, because we were trying to find all of our coworkers. Finally, we all went our separate ways home. I took MARTA westbound to where I'd parked 9 hours before. The MARTA trains weren't moving very often. Everyone on the train looked like I did. Confused, a little scared, a little angry. I befriended a family on the train. I can't remember their names now. I remember they were from Oregon and their son was an athlete on the US rifle team. They said he'd medalled that day. A bronze medal. Best day of his life. They were celebrating in the park, in the family area behind the stage, when the bomb went off. I traded them a Swatch pin (notoriously hard to get and "valuable") for their AT&T Olympic Family Village pin (also notoriously hard to get and "valuable").

I went home and drank 3 beers in about 30 seconds. I called my parents, who were up at a lake house. They didn't know about the bombing, so by waking up and telling them, I freaked them out much worse than they would've been. Then I watched the news for about 3 hours. I heard about Alice Hawthorne. I heard about the Turkish journalist who'd been killed in the rush after the bomb. I felt lucky to be alive.

They determined that the bomb went off and sprayed shrapnel right at our building. There were cantaloupe sized holes at eye-level in our building. Had I been stationed at the exit, I may have been injured very badly or worse.

They shut down the park for a few days. Swatch paid us for the downtime, and hired a bunch of former Secret Service agents for our protection once the park reopened.

A few months later I was interviewed, via phone, by the FBI in connection with the bombing investigation. I didn't have much to add, except what I've written above.

So today Eric Rudolph was sentenced to spend the rest of his life in jail. And I'm happy. He's a monster, a pure terrorist in every sense of the word. And as terrible as he is, I feel more of a tangible tie to this case.

I believe he tried to kill me.

And I don't like that. And that's why I'm glad that our justice system still works, despite his abettors in the woods of Western North Carolina. I'm glad he'll never be free again. And I might sleep a little better because of it.