Just as awful now as it was in 2012
ASHLEY CECH WAS INSIDE an NYU classroom — taking one of the last finals of her fall semester — when the text message arrived.
“Shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary,” read the Dec. 14, 2012, missive from a pal with ties to Cech’s hometown of Newtown, Conn. “Schools are in lockdown.” The daughter of a Sandy Hook Elementary School librarian, Cech’s initial reaction was disbelief. A school shooting in Newtown? Impossible, she told herself. “If you know Newtown, if you know Sandy Hook, you just had this idea that nothing wrong could happen there,” Cech, now 22, recalled.
It would be less than an hour later that Cech learned her fairy tale vision of the town where she grew up had been shattered by a madman armed with an assault rifle.
Cech’s mother, Yvonne, managed to escape the massacre unharmed after shepherding 18 fourth-graders into a closet and barricading the door.
But like many Newtown residents, Cech is still grappling with the horror of that unforgettable day two years later.
“There was a lot of heartbreak and devastation in the community after that,” Cech said, “and we’re still piecing ourselves together.”
The details of that grim December morning have by now been seared into the nation’s collective conscience.
Adam Lanza, after barging inside Sandy Hook Elementary School, slaughtered 20 students and six school staff members.
The deranged 20-year-old began his rampage by shooting his sleeping mother, Nancy Lanza, in the head. It ended when he killed himself inside the school as cops closed in.
Adam Lanza had severe emotional problems and an obsession with violence, but why he targeted the school remains a mystery.
Sandy Hook Elementary was demolished last year. The Lanza home is still standing, unoccupied and reviled, a macabre draw for curiosity-seekers.
For people close to the attack like Cech, the awful memories haven’t faded.
“It’s not something that we’re ever going to forget happened,” said Cech. “It’s something that every resident of Newtown is going to carry with them for the rest of their lives.”
The mass school shooting, the second-deadliest in U.S. history, spurred Cech into a life of activism.
Motivated by frustration over the federal government’s failure to enact gun legislation, she started working for the group Everytown for Gun Safety after graduating college this year.
“I was devastated and couldn’t believe that the country hadn’t pulled together and decided . . . it was time to make a change,” said Cech, a member of the organization’s survivor outreach team. “I decided to become a part of where that conversation was going.”
Studies show that the national discussion over gun rights remains hotly divided.
There have been 94 school shootings since Newtown, according to Everytown for Gun Safety.
And yet, for the first time in at least 20 years, a majority of Americans say it’s more important to protect the right to own firearms than to control gun ownership, according to a recent Pew Research Center survey.
The survey found that 52% of Americans sided with gun rights while 46% favored gun control.
When Cech joins her family for a quiet day of reflection Sunday, she doesn’t expect a focus on statistics or studies.
Just being around one another is comforting, Cech said.
Despite everything that Newtown has endured, she sometimes finds herself still struggling to accept that the idyllic town where she grew up was rocked by such a horrific tragedy.
“It’s still very hard to believe even though we went to 26 funerals,” Cech said. “It’s still very surreal, very hard to wrap your head around.”