She was shamed for even now getting her Christmas lights up. Neighbors are now putting theirs back up in solidarity.

The anonymous, typed letter read: “Take your Xmas lights down! Its Valentines Day!!!!!!”

Though the letter would have upset her in typical circumstances, Pascucci said, it hit specifically hard now. She shed both her father and her aunt to covid-19, the disorder brought about by the coronavirus, in January, a lot less than one 7 days apart.

Her father, who lived with her, put up the Xmas decorations right away after Thanksgiving — as he did each and every yr. In the months pursuing his loss of life on Jan. 15, Pascucci could not deliver herself to take the decorations down. Obtaining the harsh letter, she claimed, was “a big blow to the coronary heart.”

“No a person really appreciates what is going on inside of the property or why we didn’t just take down the decorations,” stated Pascucci, 31. “I couldn’t believe a person would do this.”

She shared the letter in the Extensive Island Moms Facebook team and described why it was notably agonizing, in the hopes that the anonymous sender may possibly see her post.

“For anyone in the Bethpage location — if you know of a particular person who would do some thing so insensitive like this be sure to pass along my message,” Pascucci wrote.

“Our whole spouse and children was sick with covid setting up December 24th. Within this timeframe, we dropped 2 spouse and children customers. Just one being my father,” she continued. “He cherished decorating our household just about every calendar year for the vacations at any time because we ended up young children and he took so a lot satisfaction in undertaking so. He did it for us, in particular for my 2 calendar year old son who he cherished so dearly.”

Above the previous numerous months, the relatives has been preoccupied with “funeral arrangements, home finance loan/utility payments, and just the grieving approach of it all,” Pascucci explained in the submit. “So certainly, we have not gotten close to to having down his Xmas decorations. And possibly we just aren’t ready to nevertheless. I will not apologize for this.”

She finished the article with “Be form to men and women due to the fact you never ever know what they are heading by way of.”

The community was outraged on her behalf. Inside of minutes of her sharing the put up, dozens of messages flooded Pascucci’s Facebook inbox.

“I was fully floored and overwhelmed,” mentioned Pascucci, a receptionist for a dermatologist, incorporating that she experienced listened to from a couple of other folks in the neighborhood who experienced acquired the exact letter. “I didn’t submit it on the lookout for pity. But individuals need to imagine ahead of carrying out matters like this, particularly right now with everything likely on in the world.”

Neighbors sent the Pascucci relatives heartfelt playing cards, flowers and foods, and a GoFundMe site was developed to support address mounting mortgage loan payments and funeral expenses.

“A guy and his wife came with roses and a letter,” Pascucci recalled. “He said: ‘Keep your Christmas lights up. I know what it feels like to reduce another person and not want to put their things away. It’s quite really hard.’ ”

Past the private functions of kindness, what struck Pascucci the most, she stated, is that a lot of neighbors commenced to put their individual getaway decorations back again up so she wouldn’t experience so alone.

Bethpage people climbed up to their attics and down to their basements to retrieve the decorations they had presently stored absent for the season. In early February, they redecorated their houses for Xmas.

“We listened to about the letter, and that night we turned our lights back again on,” reported Elaine Murray, 42, who life around the corner from Pascucci. “No 1 is heading to notify us to turn them off.”

She and her family members put a wreath back on the entrance door, secured an inflatable snowman to the lawn and programmed their Christmas lights to flip on each individual evening at 5 in honor of Pascucci’s father, Anthony Pascucci, who was 60, and her aunt, Concetta Pascucci, who was 70 when she died Jan. 9.

“They will be missed,” mentioned Murray, a nurse on the entrance traces of the pandemic. For her, the two fatalities “really just hit dwelling.”

Viewing the brilliant lights and decorations at the time once again around the community presents her “something to glance ahead to every single night time,” she said.

“Especially in this time, we must all just be type and enjoy what we say,” Murray extra. “Sara can maintain her lights on for the full year if she would like.”

Other neighbors quickly adopted match, and all of a sudden, it started out to glance a large amount like Xmas in Bethpage.

When the McGuggart relatives listened to about the letter, they established up colorful lights outside the house their home a couple doors down from the Pascuccis.

“I couldn’t think that anyone would deliver her this letter,” said Karen McGuggart, 58. “Losing her excellent dad, whom all the neighbors cherished, and her attractive aunt, who was constantly smiling, is these a tragedy. We are heartbroken.”

McGuggart’s two youngsters, ages 18 and 25, had been notably infuriated when they heard about the letter.

“They had been outraged that an individual would do a little something so unpleasant,” mentioned McGuggart, whose children instantly went up to the attic and grabbed the Christmas lights the family experienced taken down months in the past.

“Houses suddenly lit up once again,” McGuggart claimed. “Everybody has their Xmas lights on to exhibit that we’re all guiding the man or woman who could not acquire hers down.”

Other Prolonged Island citizens stumbled on Pascucci’s publish and were influenced by the festive emotion in the Bethpage group. Renee Clausen, 37, who life nearby in West Islip, determined to get concerned. She claimed she could relate to Pascucci’s tale.

“I’ve dealt with rather a bit of reduction in my loved ones, so I know how she feels, and it is the minor factors that do make you truly feel improved and give you comfort and ease,” claimed Clausen, who provided to make a modest memorial on Pascucci’s entrance lawn for her father and aunt.

“I can’t tell you how a great deal it has aided me to make her content, for the reason that I’ve been owning a actually difficult time myself,” ongoing Clausen, who manages a having difficulties cafe. “There’s no way for me to imagine there are great folks in this environment if I can not be a excellent individual myself.”

On Feb. 14, to mark Valentine’s Working day, the complete Bethpage region is setting up to simultaneously light up their homes with vivid, colourful bulbs “in memory of my father, and any one else who misplaced their lives to covid,” Pascucci explained.

She is awed by the kindness of her neighborhood, she additional, detailing that, eventually, she is happy to have been given the letter.

“I in fact want to thank that particular person, for bringing me all this love and help in a time when I required it most,” Pascucci said.