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Trench coats still trigger pain, loathing
By Jim Spencer
The Denver Post - Jim Spencer
The black trench coat was a Nautica. I'd seen it swathed across the broad shoulders and six-pack bellies of models in magazines for the 18-to-34-year-old crowd.
I bought it to show my son how hip his old man was. It was his surprise gift for Christmas 2002.
Turned out he had a surprise of his own.
"Dad," my son said as gently as possible, "I don't want it."
The hurt expression on my face made a reply unnecessary.
"I'm sorry," my son said, trying to soften the blow. "But I don't want to look like the Trench Coat Mafia."
I was speechless. Nearly four years after Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold gunned down classmates and teachers at Columbine High School, I barely thought about the shootings. I sure didn't associate them with a coat.
My son did. Today, two days before the fourth anniversary of the attack, he still does. Harris and Klebold hid their weapons under long black coats on their short journey to infamy. My son, who lives on the East Coast, 1,800 miles from Denver, wants to make no fashion statement that suggests any association with that.
"Black trench coats used to be cool," he told me Thursday. "Once Columbine happened, they had a new connotation. The coat made me feel uncomfortable."
That makes sense. Only the sickest puppies try to align themselves with madness.
Still, the symbolic staying power of the Denver area's greatest modern tragedy amazes me. It survives testimony from Columbine principal Frank DeAngelis that a "Trench Coat Mafia" consisting of alienated students was hardly more than an informal group that had little, if any, structure and no school sponsorship. It survives claims that Harris and Klebold weren't mainstays of such a group, even if one existed.
The Jefferson County Public Schools banned trench coats in the weeks after the shootings. These days, said schools spokesman Rick Kaufman, the county dress code doesn't address the issue.
"It's a school-by-school decision," Kaufman said. "Some of our schools, including Columbine, still ban wearing trench coats inside their buildings."
A Thursday afternoon trip to the Southwest Plaza Mall near the now-legendary high school suggested that much of the restriction is self-imposed.
Outside Borders books and music store, 16-year-old Jesse Trujillo and Jeremy Vigil said they don't own black trench coats and wouldn't consider buying them. Denver's John F. Kennedy High, where both boys go, doesn't allow trench coats to be worn in the hallways. But for Vigil and Trujillo, it is a matter of personal style, not a crisis of conscience.
"The people who would wear them are mostly like the Gothic or skater kids," said Vigil.
"It doesn't have any meaning unless you make it like the Trench Coat Mafia," Trujillo added. "It wasn't the coats that shot up Columbine. It was the kids."
That's True. But the closer you get to the tragedy, the more symbolism seems to matter.
Shuffling through the mall in baggy jeans, T-shirts and sneakers, Trent Pickering, Jared Preeson, John Russo and Ryan Campbell looked respectably hip-hop. They didn't consider their look thuggish. To a person, however, the Chatfield High School students understood their school's ban on trench coats in the hallways.
That's because Chatfield is in Littleton, near Columbine, and Chatfield temporarily took in the Columbine student body after Harris' and Klebold's rampage.
"One of our friends had a step-brother who died at Columbine," said Preeson.
"Two months ago they made a kid take a trench coat off at school," said Campbell. "I think it is disrespectful to the families that lost their loved ones to wear a trench coat."
"It's an image thing" said Russo.
It's also an eye-of-the-beholder thing.
Pickering considers the long green coat his father wears in bad weather a "rain coat."
Columbine principal DeAngelis can't conceive of a day when his school will lift the trench coat ban.
"We're still dealing with the aftermath of the tragedy," DeAngelis said Thursday. "We have people with post traumatic stress disorder. There are certain triggers. Trench coats are certainly one."
Josh Townsend's sister, Lauren, died in the Columbine library. For Townsend, 25, the sight of a black trench coat still hurts.
"It triggers a memory of the people who were responsible for the shootings," Townsend said.
He may never own a trench coat, he added, at least not a black one.
I kept the black trench coat my son turned down. I wear it in rain and snow. Just before I came to Denver I wore it to the office at my old newspaper. An editor, a woman in her 30's, looked at me.
"I see you have on your Columbine trench coat," she said.
That's not what it is, but it may be years before I can convince anyone.
Jim Spencer's column appears Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays in The Denver Post. Contact him at [email protected] .
By Jim Spencer
The Denver Post - Jim Spencer
The black trench coat was a Nautica. I'd seen it swathed across the broad shoulders and six-pack bellies of models in magazines for the 18-to-34-year-old crowd.
I bought it to show my son how hip his old man was. It was his surprise gift for Christmas 2002.
Turned out he had a surprise of his own.
"Dad," my son said as gently as possible, "I don't want it."
The hurt expression on my face made a reply unnecessary.
"I'm sorry," my son said, trying to soften the blow. "But I don't want to look like the Trench Coat Mafia."
I was speechless. Nearly four years after Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold gunned down classmates and teachers at Columbine High School, I barely thought about the shootings. I sure didn't associate them with a coat.
My son did. Today, two days before the fourth anniversary of the attack, he still does. Harris and Klebold hid their weapons under long black coats on their short journey to infamy. My son, who lives on the East Coast, 1,800 miles from Denver, wants to make no fashion statement that suggests any association with that.
"Black trench coats used to be cool," he told me Thursday. "Once Columbine happened, they had a new connotation. The coat made me feel uncomfortable."
That makes sense. Only the sickest puppies try to align themselves with madness.
Still, the symbolic staying power of the Denver area's greatest modern tragedy amazes me. It survives testimony from Columbine principal Frank DeAngelis that a "Trench Coat Mafia" consisting of alienated students was hardly more than an informal group that had little, if any, structure and no school sponsorship. It survives claims that Harris and Klebold weren't mainstays of such a group, even if one existed.
The Jefferson County Public Schools banned trench coats in the weeks after the shootings. These days, said schools spokesman Rick Kaufman, the county dress code doesn't address the issue.
"It's a school-by-school decision," Kaufman said. "Some of our schools, including Columbine, still ban wearing trench coats inside their buildings."
A Thursday afternoon trip to the Southwest Plaza Mall near the now-legendary high school suggested that much of the restriction is self-imposed.
Outside Borders books and music store, 16-year-old Jesse Trujillo and Jeremy Vigil said they don't own black trench coats and wouldn't consider buying them. Denver's John F. Kennedy High, where both boys go, doesn't allow trench coats to be worn in the hallways. But for Vigil and Trujillo, it is a matter of personal style, not a crisis of conscience.
"The people who would wear them are mostly like the Gothic or skater kids," said Vigil.
"It doesn't have any meaning unless you make it like the Trench Coat Mafia," Trujillo added. "It wasn't the coats that shot up Columbine. It was the kids."
That's True. But the closer you get to the tragedy, the more symbolism seems to matter.
Shuffling through the mall in baggy jeans, T-shirts and sneakers, Trent Pickering, Jared Preeson, John Russo and Ryan Campbell looked respectably hip-hop. They didn't consider their look thuggish. To a person, however, the Chatfield High School students understood their school's ban on trench coats in the hallways.
That's because Chatfield is in Littleton, near Columbine, and Chatfield temporarily took in the Columbine student body after Harris' and Klebold's rampage.
"One of our friends had a step-brother who died at Columbine," said Preeson.
"Two months ago they made a kid take a trench coat off at school," said Campbell. "I think it is disrespectful to the families that lost their loved ones to wear a trench coat."
"It's an image thing" said Russo.
It's also an eye-of-the-beholder thing.
Pickering considers the long green coat his father wears in bad weather a "rain coat."
Columbine principal DeAngelis can't conceive of a day when his school will lift the trench coat ban.
"We're still dealing with the aftermath of the tragedy," DeAngelis said Thursday. "We have people with post traumatic stress disorder. There are certain triggers. Trench coats are certainly one."
Josh Townsend's sister, Lauren, died in the Columbine library. For Townsend, 25, the sight of a black trench coat still hurts.
"It triggers a memory of the people who were responsible for the shootings," Townsend said.
He may never own a trench coat, he added, at least not a black one.
I kept the black trench coat my son turned down. I wear it in rain and snow. Just before I came to Denver I wore it to the office at my old newspaper. An editor, a woman in her 30's, looked at me.
"I see you have on your Columbine trench coat," she said.
That's not what it is, but it may be years before I can convince anyone.
Jim Spencer's column appears Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays in The Denver Post. Contact him at [email protected] .
Looks like the kid gets it.... Why can't Jim Spencer?
I don't think he ever took me up on the offer. 
'ed
