TUMBLER RIDGE — Linda LaRocque and her husband have lived in the friendly, welcoming, woodland town of Tumbler Ridge for 12 years, and they say major things don't happen there. "The last time we were on the news, the beavers ate the cable to our TV. That's Tumble Ridge. This is not. It just is not at all," said LaRocque. She told a story about when her husband was sick with cancer and got sent to Alberta for treatment shortly after they moved to Tumbler Ridge, leaving her home alone with four young children. "I would wake up in the morning, and there would be a crock pot of stew out on the table, or a bag of groceries, or flowers and a card, or cookies for the kids for people they didn't even know," LaRocque said. "They heard that, you know, David was second away, and they just wanted to help. They do things like that all the time. It's, it's quite amazing, and we do it back."A similar message of love, service and safety can be heard from most other Tumbler Ridge residents. Those values were put to the test on Tuesday, however, when Jesse Strang (legal name Van Rootselaar), an 18-year-old biological male who had begun transitioning to female, took the lives of eight victims and injured 25 more at Tumbler Ridge Secondary School. .LaRocque and her husband are the legal guardians of their granddaughter, Mya, who attends Tumbler Ridge Secondary School.When the shooting happened, LaRocque's husband was inside the health centre that sits feet away from the school, and when the shooting happened, he said that all that he could do was sit and wait to findout if their granddaughter was going to be okay.Inside the school, Mya was stuck in a closet, hiding for her life, along with 16 other students."She said it smelled like wet dog, and one kid kept farting," LaRocque said. "But they could hear the shots. They could hear the desks there is being thrown over as the shooter went through the library up there, and they heard the final shot that they finally realized was Jesse killing himself."Outside the school, the LaRocques were left in the dark about Mya's well-being for several hours."You don't know who is coming out of that school," LaRocque said. "We still don't know that our Maya hadn't been shot, right? We didn't know. We couldn't get any information.".Eventually, one of the parents who had been watching the students walk out of the school messaged LaRocque to let her know their granddaughter was safe."Once we knew she was safe, we were, of course, very relieved about that," LaRocque said. "But watching everybody, all the kids come from school, they were shaken. The teachers were, I've never seen that colour on teachers before."However, throughout the turmoil of the situation, Tumbler Ridge responded in the only way inwhich they knew how.In true Tumbler Ridge fashion, the pizza restaurant at the community centre, where the students had been evacuated, began making dozens of pizzas for people. Another group came and made hotdogs and popcorn. People brought blankets to keep individuals warm."It was amazing that the town pitched in, as they always do," LaRocque said. "You can always rely on this town to pitch in.".Despite Tumbler Ridge holding firm to its supportive and loving roots throughout the tragedy, a sense of sadness still resonates in the town. The emotional impact of Canada's second-deadliest school shooting would be felt in any community, but is amplified when the question of, "Did you know any of the victims?" is instantly met with, "Of course. This is Tumbler Ridge, you know everybody.""Shocked and then immense sorrow, I would say, was my most overwhelming feeling," LaRocque said. "I get the loss of life, those children who are lost.""We've lost a son, and your heart is ripped out, your brain turns to mush. Everything around you becomes less than real, and it takes a long time to get past that. And my heart goes out to these families."The LaRocques not only knew the victims from the school, but they were also neighbours of the shooter's family, including Strang's mother and step-brother, who were also killed. "It also goes out to the family of the shooter, because that was a mental illness," LaRocque said. "That wasn't your average neurotypical person that went out and went, 'Oh, I'm going to do this and just gain notoriety.' This is mental health, and we just don't have it up here."Strang had suffered from mental health issues for a number of years, and the RCMP had responded to their Tumbler Ridge residence and had them removed for psychiatric treatment on multiple occasions..According to LaRocque, Tumbler Ridge lacks mental health facilities and treatment options, especially regarding long-term treatment. The one councillor at the local health centre is often booked and can't serve the whole town."There's no beds here that if your child needs in facility care, you're not going to get it," LaRocque said. "So you have to take your child home. And we did that for like a year, until we realized that no you can't do that, that you're not doing them any favor so you break your family up again to be able to get care for your kids."LaRocque and her husband believe that Strang fell victim to not having the support and counselling needed for their mental health."If it had been here 10 years ago for that family, I think there would have been a different outcome," LaRoucque said. "It's hard to heal without any help."Which is why she hopes that something good that comes from this massive tragedy is that Tumbler Ridge gets the proper mental health infrastructure it needs..LaRocque's other hope for the future, however, is that the surviving, loving, and safe community of Tumbler Ridge can amplify and add to those qualities. "When we went to the vigil, our granddaughter came in, and she said, 'Grandma, people I don't even know are hugging me.' I would like that feeling of compassion and care to not only carry on, but to grow," LaRocque said."I want people here to understand that to grow up in a town, you have to give it. You can't wait for it to come to you. You need to give it."Because, at the end of the day, if there is one thing to be learned from the tragedy that took place in Tumbler Ridge, it is that the community's great qualities can always break through the hardest of times.
