Little signs of a great loss

Little signs of a great loss
CRANDON — It might have seemed like a normal homecoming last week with the usual hijinks if not for the underlying memory of an unthinkable act that occurred one year ago today.
On this date last year, an off-duty sheriff’s deputy shot and killed six young people in a Crandon triplex and then shot himself to death. One year later, life in this small town might seem to untrained eyes and ears to have returned to normal. All the memorial signs are gone and casual conversations at local bars and other gathering spots have returned to mundane topics such as the weather or upcoming weddings.
But there remain countless little signs of this town’s loss, small reminders of a great emptiness. Though few talk about it openly, everybody remembers what happened last October during homecoming weekend, and for many, pain and anger of that lie just below the surface.
“You’re hollow inside. An important part of you is gone. It’s like the sun doesn’t shine as bright anymore,” said Rose Gerow, an aunt of one of the victims.
Quietly, the town is struggling with how to move forward — and if and when to forgive the man whose name some speak hesitantly, if at all.
“Not that it’s going to go away, but they have gotten over the initial shock and hurt, and they have really begun to put their lives back together,” said the Rev. Bill Farr, who officiated at the funerals of three victims and their shooter. “The community has pretty much gone back to normal, I’ve noticed, except for a few kids and isolated incidents.”
In the early morning hours of Oct. 7, 2007, off-duty Forest County Sheriff’s Deputy Tyler Peterson, 20, shot and killed his ex-girlfriend and five of her friends.
Jordanne Murray, 18; Katrina McCorkle, 18; Aaron Smith, 20; Bradley Schultz, 20; Lindsey Stahl, 14; and Lianna Thomas, 17, were killed in the shootings.
A seventh shooting victim, 21-year-old Charlie Neitzel, was critically wounded.
The town’s focus on homecoming last week reflected the resolve of a community determined to find normalcy again — even if it’s a new normalcy.
‘A loose cannon’
On her way to pick up her nephew the day of the homecoming football game, Gerow stops at the post office. She runs inside, then pulls her SUV into the empty lot across the street.
She climbs out of her car and looks at the lawn at Hazeldell Avenue and Washington Street. It’s the site of the shootings, where her nephew, Bradley Schultz, was killed.
The house was torn down this summer; relatives wanted that ugly reminder of the shootings gone. Now, a candle sits on a tree stump in the corner of the property. Six crosses held up on stakes frame the stump.
Someone anonymously mows the lawn there.
The site still stirs mixed emotions for Gerow. She asks herself if her family should have begged Bradley to stay at home that night for family time instead of meeting his friends. She struggles with why Peterson had police-issued weapons in his car.
“You keep thinking there were warning signs — there had to be — with Tyler Peterson,” she said. “They had to know. They had to know he was a loose cannon. … This should never have happened.”
Mostly, though, she misses the nephew she helped raise. Her family sometimes tricks itself into thinking he’s still away at college and will return home on break.
Gerow points to the part of the property where Bradley lived his last moments. She then gestures to where his truck sat parked long after his body was removed. She begins to choke up.
At that moment, three teenagers walk past wearing Crandon Football Jerseys and face paint. They are walking toward downtown with a bounce in their step as they head toward the homecoming parade. They keep their gaze straight ahead and never glance at the empty lot.
Jersey No. 77
A block away, people began lining the streets for the school district’s homecoming parade.
The students decorated the windows along downtown, a four-block stretch of locally owned businesses, with red and white paint. Their friends and family lined the street, sat in chairs outside Tricia’s Treasures coffee shop or lounged in truck beds.
Most wore Crandon athletic attire and face paint, and they chatted about the unusually warm weather or the upcoming football game.
“Is this your puppy?” a young woman asked a man leading a dog on a leash. “Well, he used to be a puppy,” the man replied dryly. “Oh, look how cute he is! Hi! Hi!” the woman said, leaning down to pet the dog and nuzzle his face.
But beneath it all, it was what school officials called a highly emotional week. The shootings occurred as homecoming weekend wrapped up last year.
“Homecoming is supposed to be a fun time and everything, and a lot of the kids seem to have adjusted and are doing well — but some (who were close to the victims) had a much more difficult time,” Farr said.
Standing quietly on the street during the parade, and almost blending in with the crowd, were the mothers of Bradley Schultz and Lindsey Stahl. Bradley and Lindsey did not know each other before the night they were killed. Now, their mothers stood side by side wearing matching memorial shirts.
Avery Smith, the freshman brother of victim Aaron, wears No. 77 on the football team, but he never took the field that night.
Unhealed wounds
Relatives of the victims — and the shooter — are everywhere in the town and the school, said district administrator Dr. Richard Peters.
About 145 students are the siblings or cousins of the victims. Some are related to both Peterson and one of his victims. Many of them still meet in weekly group sessions with school counselors.
“In a small town, it’s a complex process and people are working very hard and doing very well at it,” he said.
Peters protects his students closely. He guards them from interviews, and he consults with grief counselors on how to move forward.
The school will mark the one-year anniversary of the shootings with a moment of silence, and the guidance office will hang a blank bulletin board outside its office for students to write their thoughts. The sophomore English classes - former classmates of Lindsey Stahl - will be assigned to write about the best and worst days of their lives.
Peters says most students no longer overtly grieve, but many still struggle with unhealed wounds. Children and teens have a hard time figuring out how to handle it all, he says.
He sometimes gets choked up himself. During a recent interview, the 62-year-old had to stop. It all came rushing back, he said. He remembers chatting casually with the one of the victims in the school hallways, seeing them with their families in his church - and reading at the funeral of one of the teens.
“It’s been heartening at times, and it’s been heart wrenching at times. Heartening at times because you see them really working through it with good, positive ideas and they’ll come up with an activity. Then there are some days that (they) are just not doing very well.”
In loving memory
The Lakeside Cemetery is the main graveyard in town.
Lyle Conley, a World War II veteran, is buried there. He lived from January 1922 to September 1988. A memorial plaque at the foot of his grave honors his service in the 82nd Airborne.
Inches away from his honorary plaque is the gravesite of Tyler Peterson.
His headstone is a simple gray granite stone that sits several inches high, significantly smaller than most. It’s smooth and does not have a single letter engraved on it.
Instead, a small white sign stuck into the ground identifies his grave: “In loving memory Tyler J. Peterson 1987-2007.”
The grave is well visited. There are several wreathes and a wind chime with a crystal butterfly. A banner hangs next to the grave that declares: “I love you this much.” An identical banner is planted near the grave of Murray, the ex-girlfriend he shot to death.
A pink bear, with satin pants and faded pink hearts, sits behind Peterson’s grave. It holds a heart that says love. On one foot, in faded black marker, someone wrote his birth date. On the other foot is the day he died.
The students visit the cemetery often. They stop by the plots of their friends. Some slow down as they drive by Peterson’s gravesite, but most stay in their car.
On the other side of the cemetery, but within eyesight of Peterson’s grave, two young women pulled in.
It was just before 2 p.m. on a sunny Friday afternoon. They parked on a stretch of pavement that cuts through toward the back of the cemetery and got out of their car slowly.
They stood quietly next to Bradley’s grave. Then, almost as quickly, they turned red-faced and climb back in their car.
Their silence was broken only by wind chimes.
‘Hate in your heart’
Everyone suffers loss. The question is how they deal with it, Farr says.
Mostly people want to move on with their new routines in life, he said. All the families have other children, too.
They still struggle with how to incorporate the loss into their new reality, though - and for some people, that means wrestling with if and when they should forgive Peterson.
“It’s something I know people think about, especially those that go to church and they know that’s what they should do, and yet they don’t know how,” Farr said. “When the event first took place, they didn’t even want to think about it. But now, as time has gone on, they realize that holding grudges and having bitterness doesn’t help you. It actually drags you down.”
Peters, too, said some people are beginning to ask themselves when they should talk about forgiveness. He met with a group of community members late last month, many of whom said it was too early and they would have to “work at it for a while.”
Until they get there, Peters says, the community is working through an intense mourning process.
“It’s a small community. It’s something that we work together on, to help support each other and try to focus on the future and focus on the positive,” he said. “But life is never going to - there’s no normal to get back to. They’re constructing a new reality.”
“You don’t want to have hate in your heart. We have to forgive — Tyler, I guess. I don’t know,” Gerow echoed.
She still calls Bradley’s cell phone.
She says she knows “it’s done,” but that sometimes she would like to think it’s all a nightmare.
When Gerow calls his number, the phone does not ring. The line stays silent for a few moments, then a chipper male voice greets the caller with error message BMG 22.
“The number you have called is no longer in service. If you feel you have reached this recording in error, please check the number and dial again.”