When terrorists bombed Brussels this week, Beatriz Gonzalez felt the anguish of families who lost loved ones in the carnage that killed 31 people and injured 330 more.
Her daughter, Nohemi, 23, was killed in the Paris attacks last November.
“We are living in an unsafe world,” the mother said. “It’s very sad that other families have to go through the same process of pain I’ve been through.”
Since her daughter’s death, Gonzalez and her husband, Jose Hernandez, have been collecting gifts from family and friends and even those she doesn’t know, adding them to a growing memorial inside their barber shop about 20 miles southeast of downtown Los Angeles.
Nohemi Gonzalez, a senior studying design at California State University, Long Beach, had been studying abroad in France when terrorists killed more than 130 people on November 13. She was having dinner with a friend at a café.
“It was a day in which I lost the greatest love of my life on this Earth,” her mother said. “She had an adventurous spirit and a special gift of always wanting to help people.”
If she can impart any message to the families in Brussels, Belgium, Beatriz Gonzalez says her ability to cope arises from her rejection of hatred.
“Harboring hatred or revenge will only will only destroy you,” she said. “We can’t take justice into our own hands.”
Instead, Gonzalez says she conjures up happy memories with her daughter. The trips they took together. The laughs they shared. And the promise, she believes, that they will be together again one day.
“We miss her very much,” she said. “We miss her presence, and this life will be long without her, but I believe that we will see each other again.”
Gonzalez said she felt a sigh of relief last week when Paris attack suspect Salah Abdeslam was captured after being on the run for more than four months.
According to police, Abdeslam was part of a terrorist group and was personally involved in the attacks in Paris. He was shot and wounded during his arrest in Brussels during an anti-terror raid.
“I was relieved to think that one more person was caught, one less family may endure this pain,” said Gonzalez.
She hadn’t wanted to follow any news coverage of world events and wasn’t aware of the attacks in Belgium until clients began to ask her about her feelings on it. That’s when she says she turned to her cell phone to see what had happened, she said.
The Brussels attack reopened old wounds. Gonzalez thinks there’s no solution to stopping these attacks, but prays for greater security around the world to keep these attacks from continuing, she said.
“I am surprised they have attacked again, it happened so soon. There’s lots of people who lost their lives and a lot of wounded people,” she said, “but I am not surprised this will continue to happen.”
Last month, the Gonzalez family received a letter from President Barack Obama expressing his sincere condolences to the family. It said, “Nohemi embodied everything we hope for in the next generation.”
Cal State will present Nohemi with a posthumous award for “outstanding student” during spring commencement ceremonies. Beatriz Gonzalez will walk across the stage in her daughter’s honor, she says.