With the rest of the country, Bainbridge Islanders remembered the victims of this week’s terrorist attacks with memorials on Friday. Noon services were held at island churches, while mayor Dwight Sutton addressed a crowd of about 300 gathered on the green next to city hall. Calling the moment sobering and somber, Sutton enjoined the crowd to help eliminate terrorism while resolving to uphold justice. A few minutes ago, we pledged allegiance to those principles, Sutton said, following a flag salute. If we do not honor those principles, we do not honor the dead. While those gathered spontaneously broke into God Bless America, a young woman in dreadlocks quietly laid a bouquet of sunflowers on a concrete pillar behind the mayor.Bainbridge students coping with the week’s events also sought ways to express sorrow, find solace and show solidarity with the bereaved.At Sakai Intermediate School, 1,280 paper cranes were hung on the wire edifice surrounding the Sakai sculpture. Some bore personal messages. One was made from a news article, the word disaster clearly visible in large type. As we worked to finish the screen last weekend, we commented that it could be a great place to display symbols of special significance, artist Molly Greist said, but we did not imagine this terrible tragedy for inspiration.All 640 Sakai students participated in the project, started by teacher Kris Hotchkiss.Woodward Middle school students observed a moment of silence on Friday, and Commodore Center students planned to write about and honor the events’ heroes. The bottom of a red and white polka-dotted box placed in the BHS office for Red Cross donations swiftly disappeared under checks and cash. Memorials spontaneously appeared and then kept growing, nourished by the soil of empathy and altruism. A dozen small American flags sprouted near the Sakai cranes. The base of the high school flag pole disappeared under heaps of lilies and roses.The crucifix and other mementoes were perhaps not so poignant as the photograph, placed carefully at the apex of the pile of memorabilia – a panoramic view of Manhattan taken from the World Trade Center.The offerings were left at a candlelight vigil Wednesday evening sponsored by students Eli Sperling and Mat Wright. Mat and I organized it because I could tell there was a lot of tension among the students, Sperling said. I wanted to bring everyone together in an open, compassionate atmosphere, but I didn’t expect what happened. It was very powerful.More than 300 students gathered around a peace sign composed of luminary candles to read poetry, sing, cry and speak for nearly two hours. They spoke about the shattered families on the other coast. They remembered rescue workers who had died saving others. They reassured the mother of a Saudi BHS student that her son would not be targeted for retribution. They talked about love, not revenge.Some of their parents spoke as well, recalling their experience of the Vietnam war, and their feelings at the time. One noted that this was the first time that these students had experienced so deep a collective trauma.On the board many had signed, now laying on the grass near the pole, one student had written: It happened to all of us. Maybe we didn’t have the smoke or the screams, but we had the pain.