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Duncansville, Pennsylvania: Five family members gathered last Thursday afternoon in their living room, shades drawn, to remember. They sat in big, cushioned chairs and shared stories to fight their sadness.
There was the time Hillary Clinton asked them for money, and they cobbled together about $50 (Dh184) even though they couldn't spare it.
Or the time Hillary encouraged them to walk door to-door around the neighbourhood, and they overcame shyness and spent the afternoon laughing with new friends.
"She touched a lot of people," said Theresa Gropelli, 43, who spoke in the room with her husband, her parents and her sister. "I only wish she had stayed around longer."
Their wake-like ceremony for Clinton's presidential campaign involved all the usual stages of grief, from denial to depression and from anger to acceptance.
Like thousands of other Clinton supporters across the country last week, they mourned the political passing of a woman who so inspired them that she felt less like a distant politician than a dear friend.
'One of us'
Never before politically active, Gropelli and her sister, Kathy Bem, knocked on doors, made phone calls and sent donations during Clinton's campaign. They stayed up late to monitor primary results. They spent an afternoon mingling with supporters at a rally.
"I never could have done this for any other candidate," said Bem, 44. "Hillary was so prepared to be president. She knew everything, she had the experience and she was just such a fighter. It became a personal attachment for me. For the first time, it was like we were rooting for one of us."
Whom voters such as Bem root for now will help determine the next president. By the end of the prolonged and sometimes divisive Democratic primaries, more than a quarter of Clinton voters said they would vote for Republican John McCain against Democrat Barack Obama, according to a poll from the Pew Research Centre conducted just before the final votes were cast.
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