From Fall River to Boston, many feel a personal loss
Kevin Thames woke yesterday and shuffled bleary-eyed into his kitchen to turn on the 6 a.m. news, like he always does. He had long anticipated what greeted him, the news of Senator Edward M. Kennedy’s death. Yet it fell with unexpected force.
“It hits you in the heart,’’ said Thames, a 44-year-old from Everett. “Hits you hard.’’
For thousands across the state, yesterday’s waking moments were washed in sadness at the passing of the beloved Massachusetts senator, who many felt they knew personally, even if they’d never met him. Most everyone seemed to feel the loss, from elderly Irish women who grew up with pictures of John F. Kennedy on the wall to young liberals who rooted for his push on health care reform. Signs appeared in store windows. Flags flew at half staff. Mourners flocked to places to pay respects. They brought flowers to the Brookline house where Kennedy’s parents had once lived, went to church to pray and light candles, signed a condolence book at Boston’s John F. Kennedy Library. On the streets, people went about their lives with a feeling that their world had inexorably changed.
“We grew up with Teddy,’’ said Mary Todd, after praying for Kennedy and his family at the Basilica of Our Lady of Perpetual Help, a Mission Hill church that will host Kennedy’s funeral on Saturday. “If you’re from Boston, you watched it all, from the beginning.’’
In coffee shops and corner stores, office hallways and front stoops, those who admired and supported Kennedy exchanged remembrances and their conviction that his tireless, tough-minded advocacy for liberal causes would be nearly impossible to replace.
Kennedy was honored in gestures sweeping and small. At Battleship Cove in Fall River, flags aboard the retired Navy destroyer USS Joseph P. Kennedy - named after the senator’s eldest brother who was killed during World War II - were lowered to half-mast. When visitors asked why, staff member John Dewhurst, 41, wasted no words.
“Teddy died,’’ he said.
Sitting on a park bench downtown around 8 this morning, Maria Petropoulos, a 39-year-old from Nashua, struggled to wrap her mind around his death.
She didn’t usually admire politicians, she said. But Kennedy was different. To her, he symbolized progressive politics and a hope that things could be better. In her mind, when Kennedy died, so did an era.
“It’s like turning the page of history,’’ she said. “It’s a very sad day. They talk about the Obamas being the new Kennedys. I guess he passed the baton.’’
Walking across City Hall Plaza from his home in the North End, Sal Bosco, 54, said that like any good Boston Democrat, he was taking Kennedy’s passing hard.
“He was a legend,’’ he said, shaking his head to drive home the point. “He tried to help the working people. You wonder what comes next.’’
But for most, the death of the longtime senator and patriarch of the Kennedy clan resonated on a personal level. Many said they felt deep sympathy for his family, still recovering from the recent death of Kennedy’s sister, Eunice Kennedy Shriver. “I just feel so sad for them,’’ said Lucille Hardy, 53, of Acushnet, outside her office downtown. “To have two siblings die so close to each other - that must be heartbreaking.’’
Others said they were never enamored by the Kennedy myth, and even supporters said they had a hard time looking past the Chappaquiddick scandal.
“In many ways, he was a great leader, a great man,’’ said Michael Nardone, a 53-year-old from Jamaica Plain, from the steps of the Mission Hill church. “But he made a terrible mistake, and that’s hard to forget. It’s always in the back of my mind.’’
At the JFK Library, locals joined immigrants from Africa in celebrating the Kennedy legacy. Merid Yohannes, a Lowell resident who moved from East Africa 35 years ago, brought his 13-year-old daughter to the museum to honor Kennedy. They were proud to be there, he said.
Mary Beth Grady, 58, an Atlanta resident who had been vacationing in the Berkshires and was also at the library, felt obligated to spend her one day in Boston remembering Kennedy.
She wept as she watched Kennedy’s televised remarks at the funeral of his brother, Robert.
At the Brookline home where John F. Kennedy was born, there were flowers, and more tears. Among those who came to pay their respects at both Kennedy monuments, some remembered seeing their parents cry over John Kennedy’s assassination.
“I understand now why she was crying,’’ said Francine Kindell, a 57-year-old from Boston.
Noah Bierman, Stephanie Ebbert, and Geoff Edgers of the Globe Staff contributed to this report. 
