Joy Cipoletti

12/22/1959 – 10/10/2020

Art and Shaney Cipoletti’s first child and Christmas Joy was born in Mount Lebanon, PA and grew up in Colorado Springs with seven younger siblings. After graduating from CU Boulder, she moved to Northern Virginia, where playing in a church folk group would introduce her to a group of lifelong friends. Twenty years later, she returned to Colorado with her three children. She played an active part in family’s lives, laughing through holiday fun, comforting through hardships, and celebrating countless birthdays and anniversaries.

Joy inspired many people as she created a life she would be happy living. Drawing on the community she joined in Colorado, Joy found and gave support and mentorship. As a self-employed freelance writer, she supported her children through high school and college. Additionally, she found a whole new level of physical fitness to meet the demands of her love of the outdoors – including squatting over 200 pounds and bench-pressing over 135 pounds at 60 years old!

Joy found happiness and comfort in the quiet solitude of Colorado’s mountains. In her last decade, she tried a range of outdoor activities, from cross-country skiing to canyoneering. Hoping to climb Mount Rainier for her 60 th birthday, Joy took a high alpine mountaineering class. Though COVID changed plans, she continued her adventures, going on her first solo backpacking trip and hiking as often as she could. Joy fell, doing what she loved, as she descended from the summit of her 33 rd Colorado 14er.

Her children (Kristin, Kevin, Anthony Giordano), siblings (Chris, Jan, Kevin, Terry, Sherri, Andrea, Michael), parents, nieces, nephews, other family, and many friends will all miss her beyond words. We remember Joy as a source of strength and inspiration, a compassionate listener, a hiker, a reader, a writer, a coffee drinker, a vegan, a mentor, a lover of life, and a source of unconditional love and kindness.

We will be planning an outdoor celebration of life in summer 2021. For those who would like to make a donation in Joy’s honor, we ask that you contribute to Alamosa Volunteer Search and Rescue, who brought her back to us, or to one of the charities to which she donated monthly: Natural Resources Defense Council, Environmental Defense Fund, The Nature Conservancy or World Wildlife Fund.