For a city trapped in its tragedy, the last of the local funerals for victims of the Robb Elementary School shooting in Uvalde marked a turning point. Weeks of ritualized mourning now give way to lifetimes of less structured grief.
Pallbearers carried Layla Salazar’s white, yellow and light blue casket into Sacred Heart Catholic Church on Thursday for her funeral mass in Uvalde.UVALDE — From Sacred Heart Catholic Church, the path to eternal rest is a 1-mile drive down Fort Clark Road to Hillcrest Memorial Cemetery.
For a city trapped in its tragedy, the last of the local funerals marked a turning point. Weeks of ritualized mourning now give way to lifetimes of less structured grief. That last mile to the cemetery is also the first mile of the road to come for those left behind, trying not so much to move on as to some way, somehow find a path forward.
“That’s what this community is about,” Martinez said on a recent evening in between back-to-back funerals. “I wanted them to see it.”was led by a silver hearse carrying a sweet little girl’s casket — white and yellow with sunflowers against a blue background on the lid. At one memorial, the mourners brought with them so many white pillar candles, set in a halo encircling the white crosses bearing the names of the dead, that the scent of melted wax under the harsh sun permeated the entire square.
The quieter road ahead for this grieving community was perhaps best captured at the cemetery at dusk on the eve of Layla’s funeral, when loved ones of the children already buried visited graves. Some crouched down, reflecting quietly next to mounds of dirt that had not yet receded into the Earth; others tended to the flowers and tributes left behind. One family gathered around a grave with drinks in hand and young children playing on blankets laid out nearby.
The families of Robb will remain inextricably linked, each starting every day knowing they will live it out differently than they should have, without their children or their mothers.Some might turn inward, closing themselves off from a world that no longer includes their child. If previous school shootings are an indication, some will seek purpose in their loss, pushing for change that may never come. Some have already started.
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