The deaths of five family members on March 10 have left Manoa Valley in a state of shock and disbelief. The catastrophic failure of a husband and father to fulfill his elemental duty to provide for and protect his family is a chilling reminder that nothing is what it seems, that hidden behind a facade of propriety lies a distorted tale of harrowing consequence.
Why Paris Oda, an astute professional who enjoyed the trust of his patients, turned himself into a one-man weapon of mass destruction is anyone’s guess. The world is filled with people dogged by ambiguities and contradictions. But while only God can forgive him for committing familicide, there is a case to be made for pitying him.
Crushing debt is believed to have been the guilty cause of his misery. If so, then he must have been up against a kind of psychological torture. Unarguably, debt is blight on the hide of society. It defeats our better instincts. The pressure that debt brings to bear on a man can be as crippling as a drug addiction. As the pandemic took its toll on Oda’s chiropractic business, his inability to provide for his dependents must have been devastating to his self-esteem.
To want answers is neither voyeuristic nor an attempt to rationalize a predicament largely of his own making. Nor is it enough to take refuge in expressions of grief as a way to look past what we still don’t know. What is obvious is that this tragedy has cast a pall of sadness over a valley that has been stunned speechless by a brutal crime, a valley that until the events of that fateful night, was its last best bet on hope.
Manoa residents are linked by something far deeper than mere proximity. Manoa is an earthly paradise, a peaceful place of profusion, free of intrusions from the outside world. There is timeless beauty in its quiet neighborhoods. Its ambrosial air fills our lungs. Its schools are the best in the state. Its families go back generations. Last Sunday’s killings offer a graphic lesson in caprice. The exclusivity we had come to expect for so long was shattered, making it clear to us with biblical force that no community is immune, not even one as utopic as ours.
If I’m honest, I am unmoved by the immensity of catastrophe brought about by huge impersonal events I cannot control. My callousness, however, does not extend to unspeakable violence against neighbors walking distance from my doorstep. As a community, we darkly mourn the lost lives of three innocent children and their parents. We struggle in vain to understand a senseless act without any reason or good in it. Moreover, we are confronted by the stark realization that we are powerless to prevent it from happening again. Manoa’s infinitely prolonged slumber has come to an abrupt end. Suddenly, we are in anguish over the human cost of an arbitrary world where the data reveal that nothing is certain but the ever-present threat of violence.
Ted Pizzino is a retired United Airlines flight attendant and a 40-year resident of Manoa Valley.
