What I Learned from Daniel

Daniel passed in late November, 2008

Daniel, as he was at nine, sitting on his desk before all the computer gear came.

In late November our beloved twelve year old son Daniel died suddenly. The day after a perfect Thanksgiving, he came into our bedroom, tried to con us into getting a cat, then walked into the hall bathroom and died. When we heard him fall, we ran to the bathroom, unlocked it with the pin key, and proceeded to do the best CPR of our lifetime, while our daughter called 911. Daniel had allergies, and so after a minute of CPR, we gave epinephrine, but he was not known to have had anything other that food allergies and asthma, and these were well controlled.
Despite our efforts, the efforts of the sheriff's deputies who were also paramedics, the efforts of our local squad and a university-based helicopter ICU, he never did respond and was pronounced dead later that morning at our farm. A day that began with the thoughts of where we would Christmas shop, by noon had descended into where we would have an autopsy done.    Daniel is our youngest of four children. Like many younger children, he drew much from his three older siblings, two of whom are nearly through college. Daniel was homeschooled, and was a shining example of how much ground can be covered when you combine committed parents with a bright child.  He excelled not only academically, but creatively as well. He created numerous animations and was well on his way to being either an animator or a humorist. His academic skills or creative talents aren't really the measure of an exceptional person though. He is exceptional because he is exceptionally evolved. He is able to read people, to understand their moods and perspectives, and he has true empathy for people and also for animals. He is amazingly articulate. You notice that I am using present tense here, which is quite deliberate. When Daniel passed, he went from energetic bubbling energy to simply gone from his warm body. Energy like that doesn't die, it simply transforms and exists elsewhere, and this is what we believe. Certainly, our love for him remains. We cannot hug him as we so frequently did, but our love reaches all the way from this lowly cold Earth all the way to Heaven where he resides now. This blog is the story of what Daniel taught us when he was with us in life, and what he is teaching us now through dreams, in this very difficult time. As long as Daniel and God cooperates, I will post what we are learning about love, loss, death, adaptation, and ultimately about life here on Earth when your heart now lives, in part, in Heaven. It is our intention to inspire and enlighten as we travel through an electronic memorial to Daniel. We will be as strong as he remembers us to be, as a tribute to him, and also to God who gave us twelve years with one of the most amazing and intelligent human beings we have ever known.



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