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Vanderbilt Community Comes Together To Celebrate the Life of Kwane Doster 1/14/2005
Vanderbilt Community Comes Together To Celebrate the Life of Kwane Doster Hundreds from the Vanderbilt community – students, student-athletes, professors, administrators and coaches – came together Friday in Benton Chapel to celebrate the life of Kwane Rashid Doster. Memorial Service Photos KD Memorial Fund Thirteen members of the Doster family, including his mother Kelly, brother Jermain and sister Chakana, joined an standing room only audience to hear Chancellor Gordon Gee, football head coach Bobby Johnson and numerous teammates and roommates reflect on Doster’s short but significant life. For many in the audience, the memorial service was the first opportunity to publicly mourn the loss of Doster, who was killed Dec. 26 in his hometown of Tampa during the university break.
Kwane Doster Memorial Remarks from Vanderbilt Chancellor Gordon Gee Ladies and gentlemen, although I am a professional maker-of-remarks, this is not the way I like to make them. The death of a young person is wrenching, but the pain is made even more difficult to bear when that death is predicated on a senseless act of violence. I do not think there is a way to transmute Kwane Doster’s murder into goodness. We lost a fine young man, and lost him in an absurd way, and although the person who took Kwane’s life is redeemable, the act itself is not. It was grossly cruel and stupid. So condemn it as such. We can rarely do anything with such an event except reject it, and decide that we are going to live our lives in ways that make such acts of violence less likely to occur. The way I knew Kwane always had the theme of how pleased he was to be at Vanderbilt University, how he knew this was the right place for him to be. I agree. Vanderbilt was the right place for Kwane to be, because he was so loved here: Please renew your commitment to your own education, and especially to the education of others, so that humans learn not to solve their problems, real or perceived, with violence, and that they learn that there are other ways. There are always other ways. Go about seeking those ways with the warmth and extroversion with which Kwane lived his life. Remarks from Vanderbilt Head Coach Bobby Johnson “The pain now is part of the happiness then. That’s the deal.” These are the thoughts of the noted British writer C.S. Lewis in the film “Shadowlands” as he grieves over the premature death of his wife. We are all here today because we are in pain at the loss of Kwane Doster, and none more so than his family whose sorrow is immeasurable. They have over 21 years of happy memories upon which to reflect. For the Vanderbilt community, our memories begin just three years ago when the football program was recruiting Kwane. Our happiness began with his commitment to join the Commodores during his January of 2002 visit. Everyone here knew Kwane in some way. Some of us knew him as his coaches. Some of you knew him as a classmate. There are professors here who knew him as their student. Some knew him socially and may have been happy witnesses to Kwane’s performance of his Tampa dance. Some of you are fans who knew him from watching his speed and dexterity in carrying a football down the field. Then there are those who knew him best: his teammates, roommates and close friends. In the Vanderbilt community, they are the ones who experienced the most happiness with Kwane. Kwane got to Vanderbilt because of his athletic talents. But he stayed here because of his character. It’s tough to succeed in the classrooms at Vanderbilt, and it’s tough to play college football, especially in our conference. It’s very challenging to do both. In just the past few years, there have been those who were not tough enough to face these challenges. However, Kwane had the fortitude to thrive under these conditions. Vanderbilt was actually quite fortunate to have Kwane come to college here. He could have chosen another university, we coaches may have overlooked the tape of his high school play, or a number of other circumstances could have changedhistory. If he had not come to Vanderbilt, this service would be taking place on another campus in another chapel, and those of us in the Vanderbilt community would have been spared this pain. However, if offered the opportunity to avoid this sorrow with the condition that we would never know Kwane, I’m sure everyone here would reject that as a bad deal. His presence in our lives was a gift. Hopefully, as time passes and the sorrow diminishes, our thoughts of Kwane will focus more and more on the happiness we shared with him. Kwane Doster graced all of our lives with his life. And I thank God for that blessing. Poem written and delivered by Mario Moore You was my ace, my homey, my brother from the state You were the realest person I’ve ever met and I love you for that I remember all the times we used to chill in the room I would sit down on the couch, you’d tell me pick up the sticks I remember that last text message you sent on Christmas day But, if we can handle the truth, he’s in a better place So everybody celebrate, put your hands to the sky Understand that you’re alive and what it means to survive Or if you sit at home chilling just wasting your time We all here but just for a limited time |
