Happy Colorado Sunday, all y’all.
Summer is feeling very much in swing, with the extra-late sunsets making me highly nostalgic for my childhood, when we rode our bikes and played tetherball on the street until dark. It seems like yesterday, but as my drivers license confirms, a lot of time has elapsed and I find myself wrangling with the reality that I am on the tail end of the demographic that makes Colorado one of the most rapidly aging states in the country.
This week’s cover story by Kevin Simpson kicks off a Colorado Sun series about aging in our great state, the challenges that people face as the years add up and the challenges our outsized presence creates for the generations that follow.
Dana Coffield
Editor
The Cover Story
The Sun’s extended look at aging in Colorado begins … at home
The impacts of an aging population can hit folks, as the saying goes, right where they live.
So as The Colorado Sun launches our look at the consequences of the state’s rapidly shifting demographics — experts project more than a quarter of the state’s population will be over the age of 60 by 2050 — we chose to kick off the project with an intimate look at older homeowners confronting a range of challenges. Three households, neighbors on the same Denver street where they’ve lived for decades, face decisions ranging from whether to age in place, so to speak, or navigate the sometimes difficult terrain of downsizing or just moving to a new place that better fits their needs.
Topics from economics to health and mobility to dealing with a lifetime of memories — and all their accumulated artifacts — put a very human face on the broader concerns around housing, and aging in general, that Colorado is addressing on multiple fronts. The Sun’s intermittent series will also focus on stories as varied as the particular problems of aging in the state’s oldest county to an inside look at a senior beauty pageant.
All of our reporting and writing aims to get people talking about Colorado’s evolving population and exploring potential solutions. It’s the best part of local, independent news, when shared stories bubble up into a statewide conversation. We hope you’ll join in.
READ THIS WEEK’S COLORADO SUNDAY FEATURE
Kevin Simpson | Writer
The Colorado Lens
People have places to go, tasks to be completed. Here are a few of our favorite recent images of people on the move.
Eney Jones of Crested Butte swims in the 40-degree water of Taylor Park Reservoir on Thursday. Jones is a masters open water swimmer and triathlete and in the winter she often trains in the frigid waters around Gunnison. (Don Emmert, Special to The Colorado Sun) It was all hands on deck Wednesday preparing for the opening of Theodora Family Hotel on West Colfax Avenue, where Volunteers of America volunteer engagement specialist, Yolanda Martinez, left, and senior advancement advisor, Michael James, stocked the bathrooms with towels and toilet paper. (Kathryn Scott, Special to The Colorado Sun) Cristina Boyer poses for a portrait with her daughter Esmeralda Soto, 7, Monday in their home in Denver. Boyer, who works two jobs as a paraprofessional and waitress, faced eviction in December. She received six months of rental assistance from Jewish Family Services. “It was honestly like the light at the end of the tunnel that people tell you, you know, that you were eventually gonna see,” she said. “And it really was, like, the light couldn’t have been brighter.” (Alyte Katilius, Special to The Colorado Sun) Denver South pole vaulter Lauren Sankoff competes during the St. Vrain Invitational Track Meet on May 9 at Longmont High School. Going into the state track competition that started Thursday, she was the No. 5 ranked 5A girls pole vaulter (John Leyba, Special to The Colorado Sun)Eric Lubbers | CTO & Newsletter Wrangler
Flavor of the Week
Aspen reflected in the clouds
Sanford Biggers’ monumental public art installation “Unsui (Mirror)” will stand guard over Paepcke Park during Aspen’s cultural arts season, June through September. (Lance Gerber photo courtesy of the artist and Marianne Boesky Gallery, New York and Aspen_4)As if you needed a reason to wander around Paepcke Park in Aspen this summer, Buckhorn Public Arts has arranged for the installation of Sanford Biggers’ “Unsui (Mirror),” a pair of sequined clouds posted 30 feet high above the public space, through September.
Commissioned by Desert X, the work previously stood over the James O. Jessie Desert Highland Unity Center, where a historic Black community was created in 1960 after residents of color were forcibly displaced from a neighborhood near downtown Palm Springs, California.
Clouds are a recurring theme in Biggers’ work, Desert X says, symbolizing freedom, boundlessness and interconnection and hope. The shimmering surfaces of the work respond to changes in light and wind, symbolizing “change and continuity, forecasting rain and storms while reflecting the interplay between natural phenomena and cultural symbolism.”
It seems like a good fit for summer in Aspen, where a good amount of programming is planned around the work, starting with a public artist’s talk at 3:30 p.m. on June 30.
The installation, described as the largest public art installation in Aspen, will be the center of attention during the Aspen Ideas Festival the last week of June, when Biggers will be a featured speaker. DanceAspen also has a special performance planned around the work, which will take place July 30 during Dancing in The Park.
“Unsui (Mirror),” Paepcke Park, at the corner of East Main and South Aspen streets
Dana Coffield | Editor
SunLit: Sneak Peek
“The Lion’s Den”: Introspection intersects a good friend’s tough love
“Vincente’s words seemed like an invective, but Daniel knew they weren’t. They were harsh and pointed, but he knew they came from a place of love and caring.”
— From “The Lion’s Den”
EXCERPT: With “The Lion’s Den,” author Jerry Fabyanic follows up his 2016 novel “Sisyphus Wins” by continuing the story of two characters, including Father Daniel Murphy, who stands at a personal crossroads as he considers his devotion to the priesthood and a longstanding relationship. In this passage, a trusted friend helps him confront the danger of self-pity. The book was a finalist for a Colorado Authors League award for Mainstream/Literary Fiction.
READ THE SUNLIT EXCERPT
THE SUNLIT INTERVIEW: For Fabyanic, the words of a real-life friend triggered insight into his own life and, almost as a bonus, jump-started a stalled creative process on his novel. Here’s a slice of his Q&A:
SunLit: Tell us about creating this book. What influences and/or experiences informed the project before you sat down to write?
Fabyanic: The observation my friend made dealt with my lingering resentment toward the Catholic Church for its unrelenting hostility to nonhetero people. That resentment was morphing, she felt, into an unhealthy complex. Her intervention made me realize it was not only detrimental to my psyche, it was also negatively impacting my writing.
I can now say that while the Church’s continuing hard stance on LGBTQ people still rankles, it no longer exercises power over me.
READ THE INTERVIEW WITH JERRY FABYANIC
Kevin Simpson | Writer
Sunday Reading List
A curated list of what you may have missed from The Colorado Sun this week.
Recent graduates pop champagne outside of The Ricketson Law Building, home of the Sturm College of Law, at the University of Denver on Thursday. Applications to Colorado law schools are up about 20% this year. Click on the image to read Erica Breunlin’s story. (Eric Lubbers, The Colorado Sun)? The amount of work done by AmeriCorps volunteers in all 64 Colorado counties adds up quickly. Managers of programs where these young workers show up are worried about federal funding cuts. Tracy Ross also takes a look at the implications of losing these crucial launch pads for service-minded folks.
? The state investigation of a oil and gas well blow out that sprayed oil, water and an unknown brew of chemicals over the Weld County town of Galeton for nearly five days continues. And researchers from Colorado State University told Mark Jaffe they sampled the plume and found people were exposed to high levels of benzene, a known carcinogen, spewing from Chevron’s Bishop pad.
? Mental health therapists told Jennifer Brown they feel betrayed by changes to the state’s Medicaid reimbursement system that were supposed to improve their lives but never materialized. Some fear they may have to close their practices.
? There’s a large new condo and apartment complex underway in Fort Morgan, where Cargill invested big to create housing for workers. Tracy Ross found out it’s part of a strategy to keep employees from quitting because they commute an hour or more between work and home.
? Speaking of housing, it took a long time to complete, but a guy who saw potential for creating multiunit housing from shipping containers is close to opening BV Basecamp. Jason Blevins has the details on all the hurdles the developer had to cross — some of them perplexing — to create 16 rental units in downtown Buena Vista.
? All the tariff turmoil could be just the spark the secondhand gear economy needs. Jason Blevins caught up with people who are all in on the hand-me-down spirit in Colorado, including Tersus, where millions of pounds of high-end outdoor clothing is prepared for its second life.
? In the race to phase out carbon-based electric generation we’re No. 7. Whaaaa? Worse, Michael Booth reports, Kansas and Iowa are doing a better job of capitalizing on the winds sweeping down the Great Plains.
Dana Coffield | Editor
Thanks for hanging out with us, friends. We will see you back here next Colorado Sunday. If there’s a friend you think would like to join us, please send them this link: coloradosun.com/join
— Dana & the whole staff of The Sun
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