Empty streets, fear leave little time for shared grief after Maine mass shooting
LEWISTON, Maine — Beers started to flow again at the Blue Goose Tavern on Friday afternoon as some regulars slowly trickled back into the dive bar. A few watched a rerun of Thursday night’s Buffalo Bills game, while some simply sat in the presence of others — an escape from the tragedy and fear that had suffocated their city the last two days.
Nearly 48 hours into a shelter-in-place order following the state’s deadliest mass shooting, bar owner Earl St. Hilaire said some friends started asking about his plans to reopen after keeping the bar shut Thursday. Safety remained his top priority, he said, but it’s also important to be there for one another.
“I kind of wanted of let them breathe and relax instead of being tense,” said St. Hilaire, 49, a lifelong resident of the area. “I wanted them to talk with each other.”
In a country where so much of a mass shooting’s aftermath has become almost routine — makeshift memorials at the scene, candlelight vigils, pleas for stricter gun laws — the eerie quiet in Lewiston, Maine, throughout much of Friday was far from normal, with few opportunities for the kind of communal grieving that so often follows such massacres.
While the, officials finally lifted the order late Friday, allowing thousands who were sheltering at home to commune with neighbors and loved ones.
