Gone Too Soon: Craig Karlen (1970-1995)

Looking at the obits of former students listed in an alumni publication my alma mater distributes every few months who have passed away over the years, I’ve always seen my 1988 graduating class at Bishop Lynch High School as the healthiest. Or perhaps the luckiest since no one from my four years (84-88) there made the list.

Though I knew without mention that, sooner or later, I’d see some former classmate from 1988 on that list. I hoped the grim news, however, would not come until decades down the road and not within the first ten years since graduation.

That changed on June 28, 1995, when Craig Karlen, a former BL Class of ’88 graduate, passed away in a freak accident while vacationing with his family in Cancun, Mexico.

During his senior year, Craig was a member of the Juggling and Astronomy Clubs and worked a part-time job at Wendy’s restaurant.

“The money is the best incentive,” Craig was quoted saying about his job in the 1987-88 high school yearbook.

Upon graduating, Craig attended Richland College prior to enrolling at the University of Texas in Dallas. He served in the Naval Reserves for six years and had siblings. His favorite football team was the Dallas Cowboys.

At the funeral, such memorabilia as a ticket stub from an Orange Bowl football game and a golf club used to score a hole-in-one were mentioned at the mass. Craig attended the football game in January this year to see his favorite college team, the University of Miami, play against the University of Nebraska Cornhuskers. Despite the fact Miami lost, Craig was happy he went anyway.

Craig scored the hole-in-one in May this year. Several attempts were made to have the event published in the suburban paper. Sadly, it was finally published on the day of the funeral.

One might get the impression Craig, and I were friends. Truth of the matter is I hardly knew him at all. I learned more about him going through my senior high school yearbook and at the funeral than I did while in high school. Upon hearing the untimely tragic news of his death, however, I did feel a sense of loss. I had a couple of classes with him, but only once in those four years did we speak.

It was on a Monday junior year, a couple days after Craig and another friend of mine, Tom Kelley, were pulled over by a motorcycle cop on Gross Road for speeding Friday after school. Actually, from my standpoint and probably the officer’s as well, I’d term what they did as racing.

Looking at my rearview mirror as I passed them by in my rusted out ‘76 Ford Pinto, I saw a look of horror on Craig’s face. He realized this would be his second speeding ticket that year.

I died laughing as I drove by, but I was not laughing at Craig’s expense. I was laughing because Tom, who always boasted about how fast his Chevrolet Monza went, got caught. Of course, Tom had the last laugh senior year when the same police officer ticketed me for going fifty-seven in a thirty mile-an-hour zone.

Craig did not get upset at me for laughing at his misfortune. In fact, he even joked about it and took the matter in stride, which is exactly what I remember most about him. Whenever I saw him, he was always smiling. Nothing ever bothered him

“Looks like Tom and I will be taking defensive driving classes together,” he told me shortly before Theology class.

©8/16/95