Everybody’s Store:
The El Paso Walmart Shrine
Photos special to the Digie Zone Network
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| Thousands pay tribute to the Aug. 3 victim at the memorial site. |
El PASO, TEXAS - They file past rainbow rows of flowers, protruding bright
crosses, clumps of stuffed and cuddly animals, collections of fluttering flags,
and posters of smiling faces with sparkling eyes that seemingly talk to the
passerby. Mostly in silence and with somber expressions the people take in the
scene, dozens at a time.
Young, old and middle-aged. Brown, black, white and
red, entire families partake in the viewing. Immigrant and non-immigrant alike,
the people form a cross-section of El Paso society, mainly of Latino origin but
representative of the other ethnicities that inhabit this borderland as well.
All have come to the community shrine that’s emerged on the
high ground above the Walmart store where a youthful white gunman from a Dallas
suburb arrived the morning of August 3 with the apparent intention of killing
Mexicans. Before he was arrested, the killer snuffed out the lives of 22 people
and wounded 25 others with an AK-47-style assault rifle.
Displaying stunned looks, an older couple from the west
side of the city, Mr. and Mrs. Bhakta, were among the floating crowd early in
the afternoon of the third Saturday after the massacre.
“I’m very sad. God bless everything for our family. I’m
very sad, heard the news,” the woman said.
“El Paso is a very safe city. People are very kind and
gentle. We never thought this would happen here,” added the man, who explained
that he and his wife had lived in the Sun City for ten years. “God bless their
souls.”
Below the milling crowd, in the sprawling Walmart parking
lot, workers dumped what appeared to be metal shelving in a garbage dumpster. A
security guard stationed next to the shrine prevented the public from getting a
better look. Flanking the site, two El Paso Police Department units stood
watch.
Adjacent to the Cielo Vista Mall popular with middle-class
shoppers from northern Mexico, the store overlooks neighboring Juarez, the big
industrial city and beltway of the U.S. manufacturing sector where many of
Cielo Vista’s and Walmart’s clients live, just across truck-laden Interstate 10
that funnels the cross-border commerce and the wrinkled pools of the Rio Grande
that delineate a sort of international boundary. For many years, Mexican
customers have trekked to the Cielo Vista Walmart, pumping money into the local
economy, supporting jobs and bolstering Texas state tax coffers.
From the high ground behind the still closed store, the
large barren mountain on the outskirts of Juarez stands out with its iconic
message painted in big white letters: “The Bible is the Truth. Read It.”
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| Victims. Photo/Robert Chessey |
In both Spanish and English, painted, written and scrawled
messages of love, grief, hope, resistance and outrage adorn the shrine.
“Wow, how sad!” blurts out a woman with children as she
gazes at a poster of the 22. A sign with a world map simply proclaims, “Believe
there is good in the world,” while a painting depicting two tennis shoes
stamping out automatic rifles poses a question: “How many more will it take?” Yet
another message in Spanish and translated to English vows: “Your racism will not
destroy my home. El Paso strong.” In a nod to local history, a homemade wooden
game of Mexican lottery features a depiction of El Paso between pictures of El
Minero (The Miner) and El Valiente (The Brave One).
One cardboard sign is directed at the killer: “If you only
got to know our people, our streets, our culture, then you would’ve seen how
precious our city is. You chose hate without knowing us. Our love will follow
you for eternity.”
Religion and politics are intertwined in another message:
“Commandment (Thou Shalt Not Kill)” or Amendment (2)The
Right to Keep and Bear Arms).
“When God created this he meant it for all people and all
generations. When our forefathers created this they did not intend this to
include radical weapons of war.
Obeying one will help get you in Heaven.
Obeying the other will help get you into Hell.”
Translated from Spanish to English, another message says “I
am going out…I am with God if I don’t return.”
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| "El Paso Strong" - the city's adopted slogan after the attack. |
Photos of the 22 murder victims are sprinkled throughout
the shrine. According to lists released by the City of El Paso and assorted
media outlets, their names and ages include:
Andre Anchondo, 23; Jordan
Anchondo, 24; Arturo Benavidez, 60; Leo Campos, 41: Maria Flores, 77;
Raul Flores, 77; Jorge
Calvillo, 61; Adolfo Cerros Hernandez, 68; Alexander Hoffman, 66; David Johnson,
63; Luis Juarez, 90; Maria Eugenia Legaretta; 58; Elsa Mendoza, 57; Maribel
Loya, 56;
Ivan Manzano, 46; Gloria
Marquez, 61; Margie Reckard, 63; Sarah Regalado Moriel, 66; Javier Rodriguez,
15; Teresa Sanchez, 82; Angelina Silva-Elisbee, 86; Juan Velazquez, 77.
Of the victims, 13 were U.S. citizens, 8 Mexican, and one
German.
The Anchondo couple was reportedly cut down while
reportedly trying to shield their 2-month old son from the butcher’s bullets; the
baby survived, together with two siblings who were not at the store. Who will
explain to him, and at what age, why he doesn’t have parents?
Rita Davis and her 6-year old son, curly-haired Jacob
Davis, said the August 3 assassin did his dirty work “because we are brown.”
Facing a stark and hard decision in the shooting’s
aftermath, the El Paso mother was forced to lay out the uglier realities of
life to her son. Mother and son have been to the shrine so far twice. The boy,
whose demeanor exudes an age far beyond his tender years, has developed an affinity
for the victims, confiding to mom that he misses the 22 even though he didn’t
know the individuals personally. “I feel real sad,” he said.
Jacob’s newfound sense of compassion is something his mom
said she wants to keep going.
Davis, who works near the Walmart and used to frequent the
store for last-minute items before dropping her son off at school, said that
she found out about the slaughter first on Facebook and then via a mass text
that was sent by authorities the fateful morning of August 3.
She said her ex works at the store but wasn’t on shift the
morning of the massacre.
“I think El Paso has been kind of a gem in the desert for a
long time and we haven’t experienced this kind of level of violence,” Davis
said, articulating a common sentiment in this border city. “It scares me as a
parent because this is the environment my son is growing up in...it’s
senseless.”
The El Paso native detailed how August 3 has changed the
lives of her family and loved ones. She’s talked to Jacob about respecting all
people but also maintaining an alertness of his surroundings.
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| Items at the memorial site. Photo/Robert Chessey |
The massacre compelled a mother to examine things she
previously had “zero interest” in, including obtaining a concealed handgun
permit and signing up for an active shooter class, which Davis said had no room
for additional students at the moment. Admitting she was terrified of guns and
doesn’t even like fireworks, Davis nevertheless stressed, “As a mother I need
to protect my child at all times.”
A tall woman with a proud poise, Davis could be the perfect
spokesperson for El Paso: “We are scared but we’re not gonna let this overcome us as a
community...I think it’s been great how the community has come together and
support each other ... we have good people here.”
In El Paso these days, “strong” is the word of the year.
The slogan “El Paso Strong” is visible on T-shirts, on business billboards, on
Sun Metro buses, in murals, and even across the fenced off border line on the
streets of sister city Juarez, Mexico.
“Solidarity” is a close second for the choice word,
illustrated in part by the $5 million dollars raised to date for the victims
and their families. Local media outlet KVIA reported on an August 25 joint
fundraising effort “Tattoos for El Paso” organized by 11 shops in El Paso, Austin
and New Mexico cities Las Cruces and Albuquerque.
At the shrine, words of love and support abound. Among them
are messages from employees of various Walmart and Sam’s stores, the workers of
Urgent Care Hospice Inc., people from Northwest Florida and Southwest Alabama,
California high schoolers, San Diego church-goers, the Fronterizos motorcycle club of Tijuana, the League of
United Latin American Citizens, State Tejano Democrats, the crew of Eptcruising.com, and the
Vaqueros team of Sierra Blanca, Texas.
One message reads “Margie, Happy Birthday,” an apparent
reference to victim Margie Reckard, who would have celebrated her 64th birthday
on August 21. After local news media reported that Reckard’s husband was
without family and confronted burying his wife alone, his invitation was
answered by hundreds and hundreds of “strangers” who showed up to accompany the
man for the final parting with his wife.
“That’s El Paso. I think it’s something real sad. The
unity, that everyone came together in the community. The innocence of those
whose lives were taken, and the families who have to live it,” commented Ana
Arciniega on the multi-dimensional nature of August 3, pausing from a walk up
and down the shrine. “It’s still a state of shock.”
But Arciniega was impressed by both the official emergency
response and the community outpouring of love. “I think it’s a great support
system...even if it’s just bringing flowers and the messages,” she said. “We
should be able to reach out a hand with our neighbors.”
Originally from Chicago but counting 20 years in El Chuco (
a nickname for the city), Arciniega called living in the city where she’s
raised her children a “blessing.”
The behavioral health worker said that she had been
on her way to shop at the Cielo Vista Walmart the morning of August 3 when an
urgent call from her daughter warned mom to turn back.
Like Rita Davis, Arciniega also has since engaged in
serious talks with her school age children, a 17-year-old and an 11-year-old,
advising them to be aware of their surroundings.
According to Ariciniega, the
school district her children attend has notified her that the issues pertaining
to August 3 will be brought up at upcoming parent meetings. The beginning of El
Paso’s 2019-2020 school year has been unlike any other in recent local memory.
Changes are in the wind at work too, Arciniega added, with
previous active shooter plans now elevated to a higher level of importance, a “Code
Silver.”
Asked about Walmart’s recent statement that the company
would reopen the Cielo Vista store within a few months, Arciniega was in
agreement but suggested that a section of the store property be set aside for a
park and a memorial dedicated to the victims.
“I think it should continue. It was everybody’s store,” she
opined.
Feet away from where Arciniega stood, 22 sculpted
butterflies topped individual pedestals. “They tried to bury us but, they didn’t
know we were seeds,” read the accompanying words. Only time will tell what
seeds the butterflies bore.
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| People bring mementos like these to the memorial. |
In El Paso the number 22 now has a meaning connected to an
act of violence, similar to the number 43 in Mexico, which after 2014 is
synonymous with the forcibly disappeared students of the Ayotzinapa rural
teachers’ college, whose fate is still unclarified. Will a certain date here,
August 3, remain forever etched in the memories of Paseños, like the dates of December
7 (Pearl Harbor Day), November 22 (JFK assassination) and September 11 were
wired into the collective, generational memories of a nation and marked
historical befores and afters?
Where were you when...?
As a hot and breezy Saturday afternoon picked up in the Sun
City, as El Paso is also known, people continued to descend on the shrine, as
if in an endless pilgrimage. A woman with sniffles and tears was consoled by another
woman. Two older women departed the shrine holding hands, closely followed by a
younger couple, a man and a woman, doing the same.
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Kent Paterson, an author-journalist based in New Mexico, is a frequent contributor to the Digie Zone Network.
