Ten Days

Tonight is the last night that the Boulder Star will be lit in honor of the ten victims of the March 22 shooting.  It's been ten days since the shooting, days of personal and communal grieving and reflection.  

 Paul and I went down to the police headquarters to leave flowers on the memorial for Officer Eric Talley....

and to the King Sooper site to leave flowers on the long fence that was put up around the building. 

And Ben and I joined in a city-wide commemoration one evening, lighting a candle in our window and observing a communal moment of silence.  

A few days ago I decided I needed to make a small art piece about the event.  I found a piece of fabric that I had hand painted a year or so ago and was drawn to its chaotic feel and its splotches of red. 

So I put it up on the design wall and began messing around and ended up with this 8x10" journal quilt, a record of this horrible event and a reminder of its impact on me, my family, and my city.   It upended our feeling of being sheltered by the "Boulder Bubble," and brought evil much closer than it had ever been.  (We've been lucky, for sure.)   

 

Here's a detail showing the painting and stitching.  

I wanted to record the names of the victims and ended up putting them on the label.  

Tomorrow is Good Friday, the beginning of a long and lovely Easter weekend.  We'll have highs in the low 70's, perfect for our first-in-a-year dinner inside at Ray and Paula's and a family dinner here on the holiday itself.  

It's time to shake off the gloom and smell the roses.  Or should I say croci?