Dear Boulder,
It's been two days since a man walked across the King Sooper's parking lot in Table Mesa and began shooting innocent people. My weekly newsletter, almost ready to publish, sits collecting digital dust. It no longer matters. We have more important things to talk about than the real estate market.
Grief is an overwhelming rollercoaster. We think of those lost, and we turn inward to our own lives. How many times have my family and I shopped at that very store? Eaten at restaurants in that plaza? Walked through that parking lot? We're all somehow connected to the community members who were lost, and it feels like this horror could have happened to any of us.
Personally, I remember meeting Officer Eric Talley. He was assigned to my neighborhood, and I remember interacting with him. I share this not because I had some special connection to Officer Talley - I don't. I share it because the Boulder community is deeply intertwined. The police officers who serve our community are part of our community. So are the grocery store workers who kept us fed during the pandemic while, too, risking their lives. So are the grocery shoppers, buying food for themselves or their families at the one place during covid where we could experience of human connection.
This week's tragic and senseless loss of life strikes deeply and will reverberate. We’re only beginning to understand its impact. The grocery store will be closed for months, or perhaps permanently, and the impact of the lives lost on the living, on our community, will take time to scar and heal. Our sense of security may have been shattered, but we will repair it, too.
I'm not saying this will be easy or that we will forget. We hurt for our community. Healing our collective trauma will be difficult. Due to Covid, we still can’t safely gather with our neighbors and our friends. We can't hug and touch each other, but we will stand present as our friends and neighbors grieve.
Ultimately, with time and a lot of tears, we will heal. The anger and sadness that we are experiencing will pass. As a community we are resilient. In the coming days and weeks, there will almost certainly be politicization, but this won't change the fundamental truth: We are more in common than different, and we must come together in order to achieve progress as a country.
Thank you to the first responders who acted so swiftly. Thank you to the grocery workers who helped shoppers from the store, and thank you to all of you as we support, comfort, and hold space for each other.
A gunman can take away ten people from our lives, but they won't destroy Boulder's sense of community. They won't destroy our love for one another, despite our differences. We will process our grief, make meaning from the horrific events of this week, and eventually emerge stronger. We are #boulderstrong.
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Denny Stong
Neven Stanisic
Rikki Olds
Tralona Bartkowiak
Teri Leiker
Eric Talley
Suzanne Fountain
Kevin Mahoney
Lynn Murray
Jody Waters
Osman Parvez is the Founder and Employing Broker of House Einstein. Originally from the Finger Lakes region of New York, he lives in Boulder with his wife and their Labrador Retriever. He has been a Realtor since 2005.Osman is the primary author of the House Einstein blog with over 1,200 published articles about Boulder real estate. His work has also appeared in many other blogs about Boulder as well as mainstream newspapers, including the Wall Street Journal and Daily Camera. For more information, click HERE.
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