For the family, their arrival has brought relief — and pain. Relief because it means they will no longer have to live out of suitcases. Pain because those boxes contain so many reminders of Sarah Langenkamp, who was killed in August when the driver of a flatbed truck struck her as she rode her bicycle from an open house event at her sons’ elementary school.
“It’s heartbreaking,” Dan Langenkamp said of sifting through his wife’s belongings. So many items call out for her, he said, “They say ‘I need her.’ They say, ‘I need the owner of my stuff for me to be useful, and she’s not here.’ ”
Those boxes don’t just contain yoga pants; they contain her yoga pants. They don’t just contain boots; they contain her boots.
“Right now, it’s cold and she has this beautiful pair of winter boots that are just empty,” he said. “I had to put them in the back of the closet.”
On Saturday, drivers passing through Bethesda, Md. and D.C. might have seen a sea of cyclists riding through the streets together. They were following Dan Langenkamp along the last route his wife traveled — and then, they rode further than she was able. Together, they rode from her children’s elementary school to the crash spot on River Road. They then continued on, riding until they reached the Capitol Reflecting Pool. There, they called on federal lawmakers and officials to dedicate resources and put in place measures that would help make roads across the nation safer.
More than 1,500 people were expected to participate in the “Ride for Your Life” event, which was promoted by Trek, the Washington Area Bicyclist Association, Families for Safe Streets and others. Among those who participated were people who loved Sarah Langenkamp, including her children, and people who had never met her but recognized in her death a need for action. She was a U.S. diplomat who fled Ukraine to seek safety, only to die on a Washington-area road.
“Deadly road design is a policy choice,” said Colin Browne, of the Washington Area Bicyclist Association. “The tools for making streets safer for everyone — people walking, rolling, biking, taking the bus, driving — exist, and they are in use in cities all over the world.”
Browne described Saturday’s ride as a way to protest “a simple, grim reality: hundreds of people die and thousands suffer life-altering injuries on our region’s roads every year, not because we don’t have know how to prevent it, but because too many of our elected officials and agency leaders are still afraid to make driving and parking marginally less convenient.”
In an earlier column, I told you about Sarah Langenkamp. I’ve also told you in other columns about other pedestrians and cyclists who have been fatally injured on roads in the region: 32-year-old Brett Badin, 5-year-old Allison Hart, 70-year-old Michael Hawkins Randall, 64-year-old Charles Jackson, 65-year-old Michael Gordon and 40-year-old Shawn O’Donnell. Those last four deaths happened within the same month.
Behind each of those names is a family that was unexpectedly thrust into mourning and activists who rose up to ask, again, for officials to do more to prevent future deaths.
There have been other rides and gatherings in the region aimed at bringing awareness to the need for road safety…
Read More: A grieving father leads a sea of cyclists on his wife’s last route
