What a grievous and deeply painful blow was dealt to the families and friends and community of the five young people whose lives were lost in a tragic and senseless car crash last weekend.
We mourn as the small, tightly connected community we are, with the families and friends and cousins and aunts and uncles and grandparents and teachers and coaches. We wish we could make it better, but we can’t. We can only help each other get through this.
And we will.
The novelist Barbara Kingsolver, in her book Animal Dreams, described the moment when her protagonist, having lost her sister in a violent death in South America, stands in a grove of trees in the Southwest. She is surrounded by friends, family members, her community and the abuelas by whom she and her sister were raised.
She likens the shocking, painful flash of pain, loss and grief to facing a bright blast, like that of a nuclear bomb. She closes her eyes and opens them again, stunned to find herself still standing, wondering that any human could withstand such a blow.
Then she looks around and realizes that the reason she is standing is because she is standing shoulder to shoulder with her people and that they are holding her upright.
We can’t bring back these young people and it is not our job to deal with the driver who caused that crash. That’s the work of others. Our job is to stand shoulder to shoulder with the families and friends and hold them upright and help them and our community work our painful way through the coming days and weeks.
Mary Harris, Eli Brookens, Liam Hale, Janie Cozzi and Cyrus Zschau will not be forgotten and have not lived in vain. They made our world better and in their absence we promise to do our best to stand shoulder to shoulder with their friends and families and help them get through the loss and the pain.
Rest in peace, young people.
