KELLER (1080 KRLD)- Several hundred people gathered at the Gold Star Families monument in Keller Sunday night for a candlelight vigil in honor of the 13 service members killed in Afghanistan last week. The monument to families who have lost a relative in the line of duty was dedicated last year.
"You live with it. It doesn't go away," says Kaye Jordan, whose son, Austin Skaggs, was killed in Afghanistan in 2010. "It kills you when you're a Gold Star family and you see someone else's life being taken. We all know there's a risk, but still, you don't want it to happen to your son. You don't want it to happen to somebody else's son, either."
Jordan spoke during the service.
"The things we go through mentally. I didn't want to be around people. Of course, you have anger, and you're heartbroken. I am so heartbroken for these families," she says. "We need to pray for our Gold Star families' hearts, that they will have peace. There's just so many things you have to learn to deal with."
While candles were handed out to those in attendance, organizers also lit candles near pictures of each of the 13 who were killed.
"They fought the fight they were given, and they did the best they could do," one veteran who was attending said. "That's all anybody who serves in the military does. When it becomes political, that's when it becomes sad. I served for 21 years. As a military member, we serve under the leadership. We go, and we do what we're told to do."
"These young men and women, they're out there willingly doing it for our freedom," another Gold Star mother who was attending said. "They're over there risking their lives. They know there's a risk, and I don't know that everybody understands that. We go about our daily lives. We have the comforts of our home, and we don't realize what they're going through and what they're sacrificing on a daily basis."
Among the 13 who were killed was Lance Cpl David Espinoza, 20, a marine from Rio Bravo, Texas, near Laredo.
"City of Rio Bravo is mourning the loss of one of our own," Mayor Gilbert Aguilar Jr wrote on Facebook. "Thank you for your Service David Lee Espinoza, City of Rio Bravo is mourning the loss of a HERO."
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