Shooting in Sandy Hook

I started sobbing. It came on so fast, from such depths of despair that I had no time to stop it. I tried to cry quietly. There were so many members of the Press around me, sniffing out stories. I didn’t want to be seen, I just wanted to grieve. I saw all the little teddy bears, in groups of 20, the candles, the cards with messages of blessings and love, the drawings by children-for children. It was real. I could not deny it any longer. I kept on sobbing.

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. The road to Sandy Hook Elementary School.

Seeing something unfold on television is safe. It’s not really happening because it’s on TV and you’re home in your living room where nothing bad is going to happen to you. Seeing Anderson Cooper standing up the street from the Sandy Hook Diner makes no sense, but he’s on TV so he’s not REALLY here.

It’s very difficult to describe just how surreal the past few days have been for me. Everywhere I go I see the Press or endless traffic in a town with only a few decent north-south running roads and glorified horse trails for the roads the run east-west. I kept seeing faces I recognized, but not because they were my friends, it was because they are reporters.

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. Just steps away from this sign our hearts were broken and our community was laid waste.

I saw license plates from all over the tri-state area. I heard voices speaking French, Spanish, Japanese and I think some sort of African dialect. They are all here to witness and perhaps see for themselves that this really happened. I don’t want to think badly of them. Maybe they’re exactly like me, grieving and they just live further away. I fear they are just riding some sort of terror-tourism bus here, at least that’s what Sam calls it. I want to think better of people than that, but I worry that too many of them just want to grab a chance to be on TV.

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. How about “No Media” at all?

I gathered myself and dried my tears, wishing I had a tissue in my pocket as my Mother always taught me to do. I thought of my Mother and wondered what she’d make of all this. She would have been taking photos and talking to people but her heart was already so broken by my Father taking his own life-using a gun-that I doubt she would have let her emotions get the better of her.

I tried to take some photos, but my hands failed me. I pressed the shutter release and heard the whirr of the motor capturing the image. I didn’t even look through the viewfinder. I was a robot. I just couldn’t do more than that.

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. There are no words.

A cold mist was falling and I wasn’t wearing a coat. I shivered, but kept on. I crossed the street and headed up Dickenson Drive, to the last place on Earth 20 little children and six adults were last seen alive—Sandy Hook Elementary.

The path was up a steep curving hill. The first thing I saw was an old graveyard off to the left. I couldn’t help but see the sad irony of it being so close to the school. The grave stones were darkened, weathered, their engravings softened, the names forgotten by decades of rain. I thought about all the funerals to come and how one day, many decades from now, this probably would be forgotten, too.

I walked on a short distance and saw the Christmas trees-26 donated by some people in North Carolina. Each tree representing a loss. Each tree covered with little plush toys and more messages of love. I wish there were 27 trees because Mrs. Lanza deserves our love and a tree, too…in truth even the shooter does. Though I find it very difficult to have compassion for him, as we all do, as a Buddhist, I must try. We all suffer. We all cause pain and feel pain. He may have been suffering in an unimaginably extreme way and clearly he was very seriously mentally ill to open fire on such innocents. But where was his support? Why did he feel the need to act out as he did?

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. The 26 Christmas trees by the school.

I thought to myself; “What if I was so sick that I did something like that?” No one is pure evil. In his heart, somewhere was love, even if it was just a grain. If I was the shooter I would have wanted someone to love me, to help me through my pain, but I know it’s NOT as simple as that. We don't know who he was and we may never know why he did what he did. The act was completed in moments, but the pain will have a ripple effect for MANY years to come.

I don’t claim to be an authority on the shooter by any shape or form. I just know I need to be a better person and to be more compassionate to everyone if I can.

I want to find a way to not imagine him twisting on a spit, with his skin blistering off in steaming shreds somewhere in Hell, but I’m not there yet. This tests us all.

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. Nice and tidy now, but as of tonight (Monday) you can barely make out any single object the shrine is so huge.

I stood by the sign for the Sandy Hook Elementary School that has now become the icon representing this tragedy. As I stood there, I watched some workers with a truck filled with palettes. I believe they were taking the memorial items and placing palettes beneath them to keep them better preserved, but I’m not sure about that. As the workers moved the palettes into position, one of them began using a pneumatic nail gun to fix one of the structures. The loud “pop, pop, pop!” startled everyone. I immediately stiffened, feeling utter revulsion at how thoughtless they were.

I decided I’d had enough and began to walk back to my car. I couldn’t help but pass by the first memorial set up by the river. I stopped, watching a young boy place a basket of flowers by yet another Christmas tree. There was a little girl standing in front of me with her mom. Once again, I started to sob. I was embarrassed to do it in front of a stranger, but she quickly turned to me and said;

“I don’t know you, but I want to give you a hug.” She was crying, too.

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. I met the child who drew the sign in the middle of the image that says; “May God Protect You.”

We hugged and I thanked her. I asked her about her children and found out she lives here in town, too.

I told her about the Kitties for Kids program to help out the kids of town by inviting them to come pet our foster kitties and she thought that was a great idea. Her daughter turned to me and told me she loved kitties and would love to meet them.

I gave the woman my card and invited to her visit. I told her I needed to find some teachers so I could donate this load of plush kitties we’d been donated. I was so happy to imagine I could help these people that as I began the walk back to my car I was smiling, even though my heart was still heavy.

What is clear in all of this is that there’s only one thing that will help us survive the coming days and that's love. Love in its truest form-not asking for love in return, not neurotic or tied to hope or fear, just love. The love from our friends and our community, our human bond throughout the world. I've been uplifted by how powerful love is-it trumps all the bad, all the evil, all the heartache. Love is our salvation.

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. Hug a Teacher and hug everyone else, too.

We just have to learn to be better about expressing it and sharing it and instead of being more fearful of each other, I think we need to open our arms and really help each other. We have to remember to love each other, especially those of us who get labeled as “misfits” or “social outcasts.” We all just want to belong and I think in feeling left out it is so painful that it becomes too tempting for some of us to act out in rage as a result.

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I got back into my car and drove to NVS. I paid Shorty’s bill and met this cat who was very close to being euthanized. Now Shorty had a new lease on life thanks to our donors and my late night efforts. Shorty rolled around on the floor, with the catheter sticking out of his front leg. I rubbed his belly, then I noticed something odd. He was leaking tapeworms out of his rear end.

In some bizarre way those little white flecks reminded me that life goes on, cats need rescue, I need to do my job. “They” need me and now my town needs me, too. I know the only way I will ever feel happy again is by helping others-those furry and those not.

And yes, get Shorty de-wormed, stat..

[There's SO MUCH going on that it's tough to catch up. Here's a double dose of blog entries that cover Saturday and Sunday. Next up will be the truly uplifting, surprising and amazing story about what's going on with the Kitties for Kids Program we've put into action. By the time I get to write it, I'm hoping I'll have even more joyful news about how this program is taking off.]

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. Land of the Tripods at Treadwell Park in Sandy Hook.

I’ve been doing a lot of crying over the past two days. I’ve been raging, not sleeping much, not eating much. Whatever I “had” to get done isn’t done. Christmas plans or shopping? Who cares? We cancelled dinner with dear friends we rarely get to see because we were too sad to go out and the roads are nearly impassible in some areas so why bother?

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. Imagine yourself standing here with the world watching.

I need to explain to all of you that writing and taking photos is a way for me to purge, explore, digest my feelings. I also feel that I want you to see what I’m seeing, maybe in some way so you can understand what’s going on here a little better without the filter of television news.

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. Our intrepid First Selectman, Pat Llodra (center facing right) at the news conference to announce the names of the deceased.

Last night I was editing photos I shot at the news briefing in Treadwell Park where Lt. J. Paul Vance handed out the list of the deceased. I needed to be there, partly to prove to myself that this was real, partly to honor the history of this moment and partly because I was terrified some of our adopters were on that list.

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The phone rang. It was 9:30pm. The local 24 hr Emergency Vet was calling me to ask if I could help a cat who needed care right away. His urethra was blocked and his owner, who was disabled and on social security could not afford to pay for it.

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. Reporters, reporters, reporters.

It took a few hours to sort it all out. The owner surrendered the cat to us because in all honesty he had no family to support him with this challenging situation and he was not mentally clear enough to understand what his cat needed done-just that his cat was sick. I made sure he was fine with giving up his cat as long as he got a good home-which I promised we would do.

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. Lt. J. Paul Vance (right) and the medical examiner (in white).

The cat’s name is Shorty. He’s a big red tabby who must have lived outside most of his life because his left ear tip is missing, indicating he was trapped and neutered at some point. Sadly, it was done too late in his life because he is also FIV+, which can be transmitted sexually or from fighting (deep puncture bites).

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. Lt. Vance holds “the list” of the deceased close to his chest.

Money. We needed a lot of it-about $750.00. In the middle of the night, in the middle of all this sadness, I stopped what I was doing to help this cat.

I asked for help for Shorty. Taking on a debt like this would put our finances into a very serious strain and prevent us from caring for the cats in our program. I needed my support group-my friends and fans of Covered in Cat Hair and once again, they did NOT disappoint!

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. Shorty.

Before I could even FINISH writing the plea for help my phone started chiming with text messages notifying me of donations.

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. Shorty after a night of treatment, beginning to perk up.

In LESS THAN 4 HOURS WE RAISED $760.00!!!!! IT IS BEYOND A MIRACULOUS ACHIEVEMENT! THANK YOU TO EVERYONE WHO HELPED SHORTY!

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The sun didn’t make an appearance this morning. It was cold and drizzling. I wanted to drive over to visit Shorty and get his bill settled. If things weren’t so insane I’d normally drive through “downtown” Sandy Hook to get to NVS.

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. The sign says it all.

I often feel the tug of my instincts to tell me where to go, when to go, what to do. Half the time I ignore it and try to “rationally” choose my next steps because that’s more logical than following your gut. Today, perhaps I was too tired to fight it and instead of driving the long way over to the Vet, I went straight for downtown. It was early enough and miserable enough outside that I thought maybe I’d miss the bad traffic.

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. The memorial—its first day.

I got there without much delay, but the center of our little district was already jammed with cars and people milling about.

I took a few photos from my car since the traffic was barely moving. A few cars ahead of me, a huge satellite truck was trying to parallel park. I watched in amazement as this behemoth crept backwards, knocking branches off a tree it was so tall. I thought he was going to hit the car behind him, but he suddenly signaled and pulled back into traffic, giving up on any chance of parking. It was a HUGE parking space. The car in front of me didn’t take it and in a flash I was parked and out of my car, walking down the sidewalk to the center of Sandy Hook, where many of the memorials are located.

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. One of so many plush toys all over downtown Sandy Hook, CT.

I felt okay for the first block. It was my town. It was all so familiar. There were the pretty garlands of holiday evergreens tied with big red bows. There was the coffee shop where we sit outside on the back deck and soak up the sun while we sip our frothy cappuccinos. Everything seemed normal. I was just going to look around, take some photos. Not a big deal. But within a few more steps everything changed. My heart began to tighten, followed by my throat. I felt like I was going to faint.

There before me was a makeshift memorial, just like the ones I’d seen firsthand in New York City on 9|11, but these had teddy bears and toys covering what was normally a place to sit and look out onto the Pootatuck river.

©2012 Robin A.F. Olson. Yes to both!

I began to sob. It came on so fast, from such depths of despair, that I had no way to stop...

…to be continued.