Nobody ever claimed the infant girl, who was found dead of abdominal injuries near Norfolk's Campostella neighborhood nearly two years ago by a man who at first didn't trust his eyes.
The baby was ferried to her grave in Roosevelt Memorial Park in Chesapeake on Thursday morning in a Cadillac hearse. Her casket was tiny, white, immaculate. Tulips marked the grave of the child, named "Baby Grace" by police. Nearly 30 people stood at her grave site to pay tribute.
So wrote Matthew Roy in The Virginian Pilot this morning. I remember when "Baby Grace" was found two years ago. There was an intense search for her mother - or anyone who may have known her. No one was ever found.
This article hit me harder than I expected. Maybe it's because I have children of my own, and by now they have children also. Maybe it's because we attended a funeral with a tiny casket for my oldest son's first daughter. Or, maybe it's just the inhumanity . . .
I don't know the mother's situation. Maybe she's in her own personal hell. We're told not to judge. But, in this situation, I can't help it. I can only hope that Grace's mother read the Pilot this morning, and somehow summons the courage to come forward. If not, may her personal hell continue, and eventually become eternal.
The coffin had a teddy bear carved in the top.
I cried . . .
