Yeah, this is just my sacred space. After losing so much these quiet moments at home where I come every morning and and do my ritual and my routine show he has so much to live for my family and my community. The love and support and all the encouragement. Jimmy Maldonado. It was the sole survivor of the three shot at Soultribe Tattoo and piercing during the shooting spree on December 27th through Denver and Lakewood. We were just working and I heard some things. But I thought I'd just fall and shatter his wife Alyssa. Gun Maldonado was killed along with his friend Alicia Cardenas, right, in the next room. I looked up and it's like that. I just saw somebody and I got shot. I kind of just fell rolled over underneath this bench and then just laid there. I can see his footsteps. And I just kind of laid there and act like I was dead. Jimmy says that's when two soultribe customers saved his life. If I didn't have somebody to, you know, be like, get up. Let's go, you know, and just maybe put those words of encouragement in my head. I don't think I would have made it and went through my collarbone and punctured the top lobe of my lung physically. Jimmy competes in jujitsu. He's a dancer and avid runner, and believes his fitness helped him survive being shot. In the chest, everything I've been doing these last 20 years. It's almost like it LED up to like this moment in time. Mentally he struggled over why? Believe me, there's many times I wanted to give up when I was in the hospital. I had crazy thoughts, you know, and like I, I just I didn't want to be here anymore. Then Jimmy thought of his 12 year old son and how Alisa was a loving stepmom. The more that I go through her things and like just read things of hers and like I just realize how freaking amazing she was. He thinks of his friend Alicia, whom he has known since their days at Skinner Middle School. Jimmy says he has to find purpose in life. The thing that's really been keeping me going is just the community. You know, in my community, my family, my friends, and he believes Soultribe will come back. It's gonna be fine. And we're going to thrive again, Jimmy says, because it has to. He has to to honor his wife and friend. I'm gonna be OK, you know, I know it's gonna take time. But there's no doubt in my mind that I'm gonna be fine and I'm gonna see this through in a good way in Denver. Nelson Garcia 9 news. That bullet remains lodged in Maldonado's body. He says he has a doctors appointment tomorrow to find out more about his recovery and where he's going next. He hopes to get back into Shuzu and back on the running trail sometime in the new feature.
