Unfortunately, Now Our Loss Is Their Loss Too

Rainy day, thunder, lightning, amazing display just for us to enjoy while God helps us out with the water bill. Ron and I are clinging to each other in the downpour as we learned of another young man taken too early from our little town. This 21 year old was in our cub scout troop and Natalie was convinced she would marry him someday, when she was in 1st grade. His parents helped with the Boy Scout popcorn and were always there with his little sister to lend a hand when needed.

My wish was that our loss could cover it for the whole town and no other family would have to experience the loss of their child or brother. Here is what I think, when this family found out about Ryan's death they were so sad for us and prayed for us. Before Ryan died, we were so saddened by the loss of Ashley and Beau and felt so bad for their devastated families. Our hearts grieved for their loss completely unaware that soon we would be walking in their shoes. Today, there is another family in our little town trying to wrap their hearts and heads around the news that their hopes and dreams for their son are shattered. His little sister will never get to be an aunt to his little ones or have him dance with her at her wedding.

Although, we need to be grateful for all the memories we got to share it is natural to weep for those that we will miss sharing in the future. Being on the beach in California without Ryan was hard, being at Disneyland with his daughter was bittersweet. Enjoying the look in her bright eyes warmed my heart even as it pained me that Ry was not there to enjoy it with her.

So this family will need to be supported by this generous community as we were and we will all pray that our town has lost enough of our 20+ kiddos for a very long time.

In Him,
Joyful
7-30-2010