The last house I worked on as a construction assistant was in Columbia Heights, a northern suburb of Minneapolis. It was a nice suburban area with plenty of street parking for my yellow Habitat truck (Sometimes I miss that truck, even though it was a Ford). I had worked on this house from the (basement) forming stages, and on this particular day we were spraying texture on the walls and painting.

It was about midafternoon, and we were at the cleaning up point of the day. This process would take from 30 minutes to an hour, depending on the crew of volunteers that day. This day we had a crew from a local Lutheran church, which included some teenagers (and a really cute guy who had given me his chicken sandwich for lunch, since I didn't eat red meat). Some of the crew were still painting, some were spreading the sprayed texture, but most of us were starting to clean up. Then we heard an ambulance drive by.

My site supervisor, L, was really worried about what was going on, since the ambulance stopped close to our house. She started walking towards the ambulance, and the driver yelled at her to stay where she was. She came back inside and told us that he yelled, "Ma'am, stay back!", and we were all a bit confused. We still went on cleaning. Two guys from the crew were outside cleaning out the texture sprayer (a long and arduous process) when a neighbor from across the street came by. He told us that we should get inside the house, because there was a shooter in the neighborhood, and that it was on all the local channels.

L ordered everyone to go down to the basement immediately, even the kind neighbor. So we all were stuck in the basement, hearing helicopters overhead, staying as far as we could from the windows. The poor teenage girls were huddled in a closet space, and I tried to calm them down, but I didn't do a very good job. I myself was just amazed that this was happening. I remember pacing the basement floor in my clunky workboots, muttering statements of disbelief. L was on her Nextel phone with someone from the office, who was keeping us posted on events.

I can't remember how long we were down there, but it seemed like forever. Finally we found out that it was clear. I stood outside the back door and watched the various news helicopters pass through the air.

I don't think those teenage girls will ever work on a Habitat house again (they're in college now, I'm sure).

As I drove home in my yellow truck, I grasped on to the wheel and tried to breathe deeply. I don't think I was able to catch my breath until I got into central Minneapolis.

Here's more about it: New Law Imposes Lifetime Bans on Gun Ownership by Released Felons
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