At the memorial for his daughter, who had died suddenly of natural causes at age 36, the father talked about a call he got on the day she died. It was from a minister, a family friend, a man who understood that at a time like this there are no words but I love you. In that moment, it is not time to make sense of things, on any level. For the survivor, there are very few things from those first days that they will even remember. And so all there is to say is that you are loved and that I love you. It foundational, a shoring-up. The father's story, his gratitude to the minister, reminded me of Marilyn Washington Harris, of course, who 24 years ago began entering the lives of families who had just lost a loved one to sudden violence in Oakland. Marilyn does not necessarily say I love you to the families, but the message is clear: I am here because you are loved. There is no starker contrast to the hate some survivors of the killed feel from the world than the quiet, reassuring presence of someone willing to be with you, someone who knows what needs to be done, who can guide you forward at a time when you feel you can barely walk, and yet all the business that comes in the aftermath of homicide is at your door. It may not even seem like it in the moment, but those few early steps forward are the beginning of the seemingly impossible task of healing. For many, healing would be unlikely to begin without the assist of Marilyn or the crisis responders in the Khadafy Washington Project, named for her son, murdered in Oakland in 2000. Without their presence, without the resources and small hope they bring, some families might never recover their equilibrium, and in that sense, the living could also be lost to us forever, just like the victim we mourn. In other words, this is live-preserving work, it is the work of helping traumatized, devastated people begin to be reborn. But it is only the beginning of a long, long, long, uncertain journey.
Comments