FOR 12 months Lachlan Fraser has been much more than Marysville's doctor. Dr Fraser has captured the mood of this town of mixed emotions.

And he did it again yesterday.

As 800 survivors and supporters gathered for a minute's silence, Dr Fraser pulled off the yellow wristband he had worn for most of the past year.

The band, bearing the Marysville name, had been his personal symbol of the challenges faced by the physically and emotionally flattened community.

"I'll put it somewhere nice," he said.

It was the good doctor's way of saying he was ready to move on; that it was time for the town to move into a new phase.

"I can tell you it has a heart; it's going strong," he said of Marysville.

Dr Fraser, a long-distance runner, was just one among many yesterday who made their way to the oval at Gallipoli Park to remember Marysville's 34 dead and pray for the survivors.

About 500 people sat in chairs under the shade for the best part of two hours yesterday. The rest stood.

The memorial service was as country Australian as it was poignant and respectful.

Among the gathering were two dingoes, a couple of chestnut horses, a tiny Spiderman and as many in thongs as there were in suits.

There were a few laughs but the prevailing feeling, 365 days later, was still disbelief.

Rod Liesfield lost his wife Elizabeth and teenage sons James and Matthew.

"Losing someone you love is horrible," he told the mourners.

"There's no way around it. You just have to go straight through the middle of the experience and pray that you come out the other side."

Joy, he said, would come in the morning.

"But first there is the night."

An erudite man, he spoke to man, woman and child, when he told of his loss: "I miss them heaps."

Before the fires came, Marysville was a picturesque tourist town with a strong economy and a self-confidence that comes with success.

Yesterday, there were physical signs that it may come back, but no-one is deluding themselves. This is a long-term project.

Outside town, on a dusty track surrounded by blackened trees dressed in green regrowth, adults and children could be seen walking through the Marysville cemetery.

A child threw petals on one of the graves, near where the Liesfields are buried.

The Black Saturday victims may be gone.

But if yesterday is anything to go by, they will never be forgotten.

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