ARVADA, Colo. — It was a bright-colored sign that started a conversation for a neighborhood in Arvada.
But before the sign was the death of George Floyd.
Teena Fehling, 27, knew she couldn’t be silent anymore. She researched and spent time learning about the efforts to stop social injustice. She joined rallies in Denver, even taking her mom to a rally in Golden. Her family put a Black Lives Matter sign in the front window of their home.
A few weeks later, a handwritten letter arrived in the mailbox. It spewed hateful thoughts and was filled with profanity.
Teena's mom, Diana Fehling, remembers how she felt.
“There was no anger," she said. "No anger from me. It was more disappointment. This is a great neighborhood, and that I had a neighbor who didn’t have the decency to come speak with us, but rather felt bold enough to put an intimidating letter in my mailbox.”
News of the letter spread quickly.
“Other neighbors saw something happened," Teena Fehling said. "So word got around pretty quickly, even before my mom posted it online, and the general consensus from the people we were talking to was, ‘Wow, we can’t believe someone like this lives in the neighborhood.'"
Within days, those neighbors put up their own signs – more than a dozen signs popped up in windows throughout the neighborhood.
Diana and Teena Fehling most likely will never know who was behind that letter. That bothers them, they said.
“What I think doesn’t matter," Teena Fehling said about how she's approaching the social justice movement. "Everyone should have an opinion and everyone should be informed. But my role as a white person is not to come up with suggestions, my role is to help the people who have suggestions change what is being done in their everyday lives. It is to listen and contribute in any way to make those things happen.”
>> Teena Fehling recommends this organization for allies: Showing Up for Racial Justice – Denver
SUGGESTED VIDEOS: Feature stories