I can still taste the cigarette in my mouth and smell it on my fingers.
I'm not a smoker. As a matter of fact, I'm a runner and have the reputation of being an avid health nut. But when the kids gathered at the vigil yesterday evening for one of their fallen yelled "Everyone light up and smoke a cigarette for Lil Jay." I couldn't help but go along. Me, Miss Play-it-Safe, smoking a cigarette alongside 75 others, 50 of whom were under 18, I'm sure.
Why? I don't know why. The motto of "kids need parents to stop acting like best friends and be more of a parent" went down the drain. Maybe I want to empathize, to feel their pain, or just to place myself in their shoes to better understand the events that led to that point.
Less than an hour earlier I was running through the park and made it a point to include the skate park in my route. My sixteen year old son, earlier in the day, informed me there would be a candle light vigil there in honor of their friend who had died on a camping trip with his older brother over the weekend.
Skirting the parking lot, I spotted about a hundred or so teens gathered there, a poster of Lil Jay, the fallen boy, was hung on one of the skate ramps, and there were two police cars. I could see something was amiss. There was yelling. As I neared I saw a girl get thrown in the back of one of the police cars and saw that the other car had a cuffed occupant in the back seat. I looked through the crowd and didn't spot my son. I moved in closer to the second police car to get a look inside, knowing my son has a history of speaking up for not only himself, but for others who may not be so apt to stand up for themselves when feeling threatened, I had to get a look into the back seat. It wasn't him. Instead it was John, the older brother to the boy who had passed away over the weekend.
I took a couple of steps back to take in the situation. I saw teens, hurt with loss, filled with anguish. I saw cops, reacting. I could tell the yelling back and forth was getting no one anywhere. I wanted to stand between the officers and the crowd and just ask for everyone to stop yelling and start listening.
As I was taking it in, glass coming from the back seat of the second police car shattered onto the pavement. John had kicked his foot through the window.
I step closer and see the officers pulling out pepper spray. As I'm watching, one of the officer's get in my face and yell for me to "Get off the pavement and move over to the grass!" I calmly said No and explained I'm just passing through. The officer then turned around and left me alone.
As four more law enforcement vehicles come barreling through the parking lot, I decide I need to go home and track down Patrick. As I'm heading back to the house I wonder, what triggered this kind of reaction from both sides? How does a candlelit vigil turn into a riot? Where is Patrick?
Shortly after walking in the door my phone rings, Patrick had just arrived at the skate park for the vigil and learned what had happened. He was told the vigil had to be broken up due to unlawful gathering. Just as I knew he'd be, he was angry. He says he's going down to town hall.
Getting off the phone with him, I take a few moments to ponder what I had seen and decide I can't just sit and wait for Patrick to come home. I leave the house with the intentions of tracking him down and making sure he doesn't end up in cuffs. Driving around the park I see that the teens, along with a few adults had congregated outside the park on a sidewalk in a nearby neighborhood. The yelling had stopped. They are talking to a news crew.
I call Patrick, he decides to join the kids on the sidewalk.
I return home, a half hour later I'm leaving the house again. This time, I had gotten a call that the vigil was being held at a home several blocks from the park and that they were taking donations to get the older brother out of jail. I figured donating a few dollars for bail would be the least I could do and I thought that my presence as a non law enforcement adult may help keep the focus on the vigil and not on the events leading up to the vigil.
Arriving, the kids had gathered the money needed to get John out of jail. They lit candles, said the Lord's Prayer, had a moment of silence, smoked a cigarette for Lil' Jay. They shared stories, had laughs. They were grasping for everything they knew to do to bring the focus back to where it needed to be.
Peaking around the corner of the house, there were two police cars parked across the street from the vigil. A couple of the officers were chatting on the sidewalk occasionally looking towards the crowd.
Fifteen minutes pass and I hand Patrick the remaining half of the cigarette I couldn't manage to finish and then take his lead and decide its time to leave, as have about a dozen or so others.
As I step out of the yard and into the street back into public domain, I turn around and take one last look at the scene. As the teens are trickling from the yard, the officers are starting to pay more attention.
I did not feel peace.
