Saturday afternoon, I was reading a novel at my secret homeless campsite in north Boulder. Suddenly, about 1:30PM, I heard a loud explosion from the sky nearby. I looked, and watched in awe as a fireball descended beneath a very large parachute, the debris coming to rest out on the open space within 1/2 mile of my position.

It wasn’t until Sunday morning, when I saw the Daily Camera, that I found out that two aircraft had collided (one apparently blown into smithereens) and a glider had narrowly escaped disaster.

Details have come out now on the victims of one of the aircraft. We might say, in trying to make sense of it, that they enjoyed full lives or their number was up or some other trite saying. This doesn’t help me at all — but then, I’ve never handled death well. And I’ve never known what to say to comfort others who are grieving.

Then this morning at Boulder Shelter for the Homeless, a man was discovered to have died sometime overnight in his bunk in the men’s emergency dorm. He had been very ill, so I assume that Boulder PD will find natural causes as the culprit when their investigation is completed. I didn’t know him personally, but he seemed like a good guy. I immediately thought that this man was now in a better place, another cliche, and then I became angered at our health care system which just dumped him into a homeless shelter despite his very frail condition. Neither line of thought is any help to me.

I guess the title of this blog entry is really a question . . .

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