The shootings in Colorado Springs, Colorado, the place my family and I call home

For those of you who know that my family and I live in Colorado Springs, Colorado, you also may know about the tragic shooting deaths that occurred downtown yesterday. Everyone in our family is okay, but please keep the families who lost loved ones yesterday in your thoughts.

The people who were gunned down and lost their lives did nothing wrong. They were minding their own business, just living their lives. Until a selfish, rifle-toting man bent on chaos and destruction mowed them down like animals.

We live about five to ten minutes from where the final shootout occurred, depending on the volume of traffic. We often pass through that intersection (90% of the time, in fact) when we head downtown. It's in a neighborhood where nobody would think it wasn't safe to walk, ride your bicycle, or stand outside on your porch.

We've often gone through that drive-thru at Wendy's, as well as the McDonald's across the street from where the shootout with police happened. There will never be a time that we will go by there in the future that we won't be reminded that innocent people lost their lives there.

The people who were shot by the gunman were random people on the street, just minding their business on a Saturday Halloween morning. This was a senseless tragedy that did not need to happen. My heart aches for their surviving family and friends.

We do not have any other info than you may have read at this point. However, this is not something we could've ever guessed would happen here in Colorado Springs. But I guess that's a refrain we hear all too often these days.

Thank you to the police officers who risked their lives to stop this man from killing more people. If it had been a Monday morning, there probably would've been more victims.

As you spend tonight with your family and friends, please keep the victims' families in your thoughts during this awful time.

Thank you, stay safe, and much love to all.

(**NOTE: Please do not use the comments of this post to begin a debate about guns. Quite frankly, I don't want to hear about guns right now. Right now I want to use this post to ask people to remember the victims and their families. Any comments that go against this request will be deleted.)