La Familia

It seems like it's been awhile, but it's been, what? A week? Two? I've been absent for longer. I haven't had wi-fi. Won't, until tomorrow. I'm hotspoting my phone right now. Whoops.

I don't want to talk about Orlando. I don't. I visited a memorial yesterday, a big one surrounding an old monument. I don't know what the name is, but it's circular, about ten feet in diameter, and the entire thing is covered in candles, flowers, wreaths, flags, and little notes. There was a stuffed animal or two, and someone left a lighter to re-light some of the candles.

I was there at around 10:30 last night. It was dark, lit in street- and candlelight. We walked around, relit some candles with my friend's lighter. There were three of us, my friends and I. A Christian, a Wiccan, an atheist. The Christian asked us to pray with him. We did; to God and to whichever deity or deity to whom my Wiccan friend prays. I thought it most respectful for me to remain silent, because I know how important it is to them. Because tragedy is really good at bringing together people of different faiths. And yes, that includes Muslims. Sorry, Trump, but Islam isn't to blame.

Hate is.

We watched couples sob, collapsing against one another.

We wrote messages in chalk, because someone had been courteous to leave a box of chalk.

We love you; Rest in Power; Jesus loves you; You will be missed; Somos Juntos, Somos Orlando; Que en Paz, Familia.

La Familia, we call ourselves.

It shocked us. Because it could have happened here. There was a vigil Sunday night; over 2,000 people showed up.

A woman with a buzzcut, a lighter, and a grocery bag full of tall candles and beaded necklaces approached, and we offered to help. So she lit the candles, gave us each one. We put them around the monument, but they kept going out because it was just windy enough to extinguish them if you weren't lucky.

The lady went to the Walgreen's across the street and came back a few minutes later with an armful of roses, distributing them among us, the people surrounding the monument. We each laid a rose at the memorial.

"Are they going to remember this?" my friend asked, leaning on a commemorative plaque. It said something like, Love wins, and was dedicated to someone. I wish I remembered the name.

"Or is it going to be like Columbine? No memorials. No services every year. Nothing taught in school."

I knew what he meant. Just there. Just there, in public memory, but taboo.

Before this, we had a youth group meeting at the local LGBT center. Ages ten to sixty (or so) were present. The blinds to the windows were up, showing us the memorial concert across the lot. Over two thousand people showed up for that, too. There were at least ten police cars.

The meeting was a half hour shorter than usual.

One of my friends, he's got blue hair and is really quick to laugh. It's cute; this little snort that everyone likes to lovingly mimic. Yesterday, he was in tears. In front of a group of fifty, and I didn't even notice until the tears started falling from his face in little streams.

"What if it'd been me?" he asked, after we discussed the eighteen-year-old who'd gotten shot. Who's dead. "What if I hadn't called my mom? She's everything. I love her so much..." He's seventeen, about to turn eighteen.

Akyra Monet Murray. Dead at eighteen. A recent highschool graduate, like at least five of us in that room. It could have been us. That was the main topic of discussion.

La Familia, we call ourselves.

A parent in the group, her son's eyes pink and puffy next to her: "I don't want him to leave the house anymore. Not if he's not in a bubble. A fireproof, bulletproof, everything-proof bubble."

Here's a list of their names.

That got long. I wanted to talk about other stuff, but there you go.