Supporting a Community in Grief

This week, our province feels quieter.

Kinuseo Falls, Tumbler Ridge

The news from Tumbler Ridge has settled into our bodies in that heavy way tragedy does. Even if we live hours away, even if we did not know the families directly, something in us recognizes the rupture. A school is meant to be a place of learning, awkward laughter in hallways, ordinary mornings that blur together. When violence enters a space like that, it does not just take lives. It shakes our sense of safety, of predictability, of trust.

Before we talk about causes or policy or prevention, there is grief.

I love Tumbler Ridge. During my years living in northern British Columbia, I travelled there many times. I remember the drive opening up into wide skies and endless forest. The waterfalls tucked into rock. The quiet. There is something almost spiritual about being in that kind of rugged, untouched landscape. It feels grounding, ancient, steady.

That is part of what makes this so disorienting.

How can a place that feels so serene hold something so horrific? How can a town surrounded by mountains and wilderness carry a story that feels this heavy?

The contrast is jarring. Beauty and brutality existing in the same coordinates on a map. A place known for hiking trails and rivers now spoken about in whispers and headlines.

And yet, that contrast is human too.

There are parents who are not sleeping. Students who will walk back into classrooms that feel different. Teachers who will carry the weight of what they witnessed. There are first responders, siblings, friends, neighbours. There is a community that will forever mark time as before and after.

In moments like this, I notice how quickly conversations shift toward blame or speculation. Toward dissecting the person who did it. Toward anger, toward commentary, toward certainty. I understand the impulse. When something feels senseless, we reach for explanations because explanations feel like control.

But presence asks something different of us.

Presence asks us to sit, just for a moment, with the reality that people are hurting. That a small town in northern British Columbia is carrying something enormous. That grief does not need to be solved before it is allowed to exist.

I think about small communities often. I think about how beautiful they are, how interconnected. I also think about the gaps. When I moved to Fort St. John, it took me three years to find a family doctor. Three years of waiting lists, phone calls, uncertainty. And that was for primary care. Mental health support is often even harder to access, especially in rural areas where services are stretched thin and professionals are few.

This is not an attempt to explain away harm. It is simply an acknowledgement that care is not equally available across this province. That some communities carry more barriers than others. That access to support, whether physical or psychological, can be a long and lonely road.

Right now, though, I am less interested in solutions than in humanity.

What does it look like to collectively exhale instead of argue. To check in on our friends. To notice how this news is landing in our own nervous systems. To allow children to ask questions without rushing to tidy answers. To let sadness be sadness.

Tumbler Ridge is still beautiful. The mountains are still standing. The waterfalls are still flowing. The land itself has not changed.

But the people who love that place are grieving.

And that is where our attention belongs.

In solidarity,

Vanessa