Feb. 05--Vicki Rae Thorne remembers her optimism when she graduated from high school in 1973.
"It felt like life had rolled out the red carpet for me," Thorne, 60, told me. "I had academic and music scholarships, and I was off to start my new life."
She took her optimism and her belongings with her to a small Lutheran college.
"Within two weeks of that new life I was raped," she said. "It completely pulled that red carpet out from under me."
Thorne kept mostly silent about the assault -- plus three others she endured during college -- until recently.
"Back then you didn't report it because there wasn't a safe environment," she said. "Except for my husband and a few close friends and counselors, I kept pretty quiet for 40 years."
In 2012, consumed by pain and isolation, she considered suicide. A friend talked her into seeking more counseling, and she turned to the Community Crisis Center in Elgin, not far from her home in northwest suburban Sleepy Hollow. After several sessions, her counselor asked if she would like to speak at an upcoming event.
"I wrote something that I thought was generic about all the women in my family and my circle of friends who had been raped, who were unable to speak up," she said. "All these women came up to me afterward and I couldn't believe it: They read through the lines and knew I was writing about me."
Now Thorne chairs the committee that organizes Elgin's annual Long Red Line event to combat sexual violence. It's part of three-year-old group One Billion Rising's global efforts to end violence against women and demand justice for those who've been victimized, and it always takes place on Valentine's Day.
Participants in Elgin's event are asked to bring a red cloth or scarf to connect with other participants' scarves to create a vivid line of support and awareness, and a refusal to remain silent and unseen.
In honor of her grandmother, who taught her to crochet, Thorne created a 15-foot-long red scarf made of different kinds of stitches, each stitch representing women who've shared their stories of being assaulted.
And those who haven't.
"There's a certain stitch I do for my grandmother and all the old ladies who couldn't come forward because you didn't talk about it back then," she said. "It becomes real clear once you've been through something, and through your own healing process. You recognize it in someone. My grandmother, a well-behaved girl who earned good grades, was kicked out of her house at 16 by her stepparents. Her fear, her triggers, her insomnia, her lack of trust, it's like, 'Oh, God, do I get that.'"
She was inspired to crochet the scarf as a series of sections, each measuring 2 feet in length. She didn't realize the symbolism until she was showing the scarf to women at the Crisis Center one day.
"I realized the 2-feet sections represent women being able to stand on their own two feet," she said.
The first time Thorne was assaulted, she had started the evening at a freshman mixer. She and a fellow student made eye contact across the room, and eventually began to chat.
"We talked about our majors and how we were both into music, and I told him how excited I was about my new stereo. He said, 'You want to come over and see mine?' And I was like, 'Sure!'" she recalled. "After he assaulted me he threatened to kill me if I told anyone. As I walked back to my room, I thought and thought and thought about whether to tell somebody, and I kept hearing him say, 'I will find you and I will kill you.' I was there on a scholarship and didn't feel that quitting and going somewhere else was an option."
So she stayed quiet.
"If I could go back in time I would march right into the student health center and say, 'I was just raped,'" she said.
But we can't go back. We can only go forward. And Thorne wants to change this world into a safer place for all of the people who need to speak up.
"In doing all the hard work in counseling and facing the demons from the assaults and the silence and the lack of support at the time, my hope was always that I would get to the other side," she said. "That's what keeps me speaking out, rather than just moving on and putting it behind me. I want to help other women get to the other side."
The Long Red Line event takes place from 2-3:30 p.m. Feb. 14 at The Centre of Elgin, 100 Symphony Way. For more information, visit thelongredline.org. To find other related events, visit onebillionrising.org.
hstevens@tribpub.com
