When Sorrow Comes

This past week, there was a terrible shooting in Juniata Park in Philly.  After a feud on Facebook, a car of 7 teens aged 14-16 showed up at a predetermined spot for a fistfight only to find their opponent's stepfather ambushing them with a sub machine handgun.  Two kids died that night and a third kid was taken off life support the next night around the same time as the man was found hiding in a hotel.

The community was outraged, and on Friday when I saw the girls again after the incident, we took some time to think about it.  We went on Facebook to one of the boy's pages where people were writing all over his wall. We watched a memorial video that someone had put together for the three of them.  In the pictures, some of the kids were drinking and smoking.  "Sometimes people didn't feel bad for them cuz they see what they doin'," said one of my girls, pointing at the pictures.

But we sat in stunned silence and grief watching the video.  It was a smaller crowd that day, just a few of us, trying to figure out how to deal with it.  "I gave him my bag of chips," the same girl whispered beneath her breath.

We finished the video and watched a news clip on the incident.  We talked about how the third boy had been taken off life support.  One of the other girls looked up at me with the most innocent look I'd ever seen her give, and she asked me, "Why'd they take him off life support, Miss?"  The other girl answered before I could.  "He had brain damage."  He had been struck in the back of the head.  The girl still looked shocked and muttered something about him maybe still being alive now if they hadn't taken him off the machines.  I didn't have the heart to explain to her about vegetative states or being brain dead.

When we started the program that day I wasn't prepared to help these girls deal with the emotional shock of such an awful incident.  They already knew almost all the details and had seen both videos before, but watching them together, safe in our room, touched us all a little deeper.  I hope that having that safe place to mourn and share would be something, at least.  They had my support.

"Oh man," the second girl continued as the others got back to work.  "I know my cousins do stuff like that.  I don't want one of them to get killed.  I don't know what I'd do if one of my cousins died."  She was lost in her own thoughts but she shook herself out of it.  I guess you can't dwell on that kind of stuff when you're powerless to change it.

I was so proud of how well the girls treated each other through our processing time.  No one called anyone a harsh name or made fun of anyone for feeling sad or asking questions.  We didn't end with a nice explanation or closure- how could you?  But I think we all drew a little closer together.