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| I arrived in the far-north Chicago suburb of Highland Park— the scene of America's latest mass shooting — on Tuesday morning and walked by two police officers guarding an area blocked off with yellow tape. |
| A woman approached them and I heard her ask if she could get through to get some things she left behind the day before when a roof-bound gunman opened fire on the crowd gathered for the city's Fourth of July parade. |
| "I was shot," she said. I notice her hand wrapped in white bandages. |
| The officers said they still weren't allowing people through. I had lingered, and as she walked away with several other people I identified myself and asked if she might want to talk about what happened. |
| She declined, and I thanked her and wished her well. Moments later, I was on the phone with Eli Vine, a Highland Park father whose wife, Erin Vine, was with their 6-year-old daughter at the parade and wound up fleeing with the girl and hiding between garbage bins behind a nearby building. |
 | | Erin Vine, 41, of Highland Park takes a selfie with her daughter Nina, 6, before the start of the Fourth of July parade. | | Erin Vine | |
| Both Erin and Eli wanted to share their story of a day that left seven people dead, more than 20 injured and the lives of many forever changed. |
| One of the more difficult parts of being a journalist is meeting people on or near the worst day of their lives and then asking them to talk about it with a stranger. I understand why the woman who was shot didn't want to talk to me. I wouldn't have wanted to talk to me. |
| So when the Vines agreed to share what happened to their family, I felt humbled. It's a big and deeply personal thing to ask. But the power of their story helps inform other Americans and gives us a window into the true trauma felt when there's a mass shooting. |
| It matters. This is the column I wrote after interviewing the couple: |
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| HIGHLAND PARK, Ill. – The face of the man standing in front of Erin Vine turned almost white with fear. That's when she knew the pops she heard weren't Fourth of July fireworks. They were gunshots. |
| She grabbed her 6-year-old daughter, Nina, and ran, dodging paradegoers as they fled the shooting, racing south down Green Bay Road and around the corner to a cluster of garbage bins behind the stores that line the parade route. |
| Vine pulled a recycling bin and a wooden pallet in close, so she and her daughter were fully enclosed. She sent three quick texts to her husband, Eli: |
| "Gunshots" |
| "Omg" |
| "We're hiding" (READ MORE) |
A few more columns from me |
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