I was not present at the Aurora, CO, theatre shooting this week, but through abundant social media, various stories of human character are emerging from the tragedy. Just hearing of the incident was shocking enough to pull at any heart.  The focus first fell on the facts — a stranger entered the theatre and randomly murdered a dozen children, women and men, and over fifty others. Then came the survivors’ tales. A man escaped the theatre after leaving his four-month baby in the aisle for fear the babe’s crying would attract the gunman, and drove away.  A writer friend in Denver knows a woman who was in the theatre who remained while the bullets flew in order to tend to her two friends who were shot; one friend survived, one did not. (The degrees of separation tightens.) Each person present that night — the villain, the cowards, the heroes — have their own tales to tell, who they were before entering the theatre, their time in the theatre that night, and the physical and emotional aftermath of the incident for years to come. And everyone hearing of the tragedy must be affected in some emotional way. We are human.

To the Aurora theatre victims: No one will be forgotten.