My instincts had failed me.
That happens. It's why we have newsrooms and colleagues and editors and bosses.
But on Dec. 14, when we first heard the reports of a school shooting in Newtown, my first response wasn't to get in my car and go.
Dankosky looked at me like I was a fool (I can be) and I left. Nearly an hour later, I stashed my car in a church parking lot. It quickly became clear that nothing about Newtown that day was normal.
Eventually, all reporters we were stashed to the side of a public park where we waited, en masse, for press briefings. We couldn't report as lone operators like we normally would. But the details took forever. And I spent most of the day on the radio telling people that I didn't know anything.
By the time the night was over, I, like everyone else, knew far more than I wanted to. And I'll long remember these two minutes of radio when I closed out the night -- again, on the phone with Dankosky.
As I think back on it, we know a lot more now about Dec. 14. I'm not sure we understand anymore. Not sure we ever will.