I attended a child’s funeral today, a silent witness to a community’s mourning one of our young. Parents come with Carson’s baseball teammates, his Scouting buddies, and his third-grade classmates. Mothers with daughters. Fathers and sons. The heads of three boys in baseball caps poke just over the back of a pew. Girls, dressed in white and black, sit close together. One by one, they rise to offer goodbyes to their friend. The unbearable nature of life sinks into parents and they stretch to pull their children close, tight to their bodies. In this moment, I remember that we define the best of a community’s life when confronted with death. The loss of a child in its most poignant moment reminds us of all life’s possibilities and all that will never be. I know that each parent in the sanctuary resonates with the pain of the baby blanket in front of them, a wrap designed for life, not for the purpose it serves today.
I didn’t know Carson but I knew his grandparents, teachers, and principal, and they knew Carson very well. Like many nine-year old boys, Carson loved Harry Potter, baseball, video gaming, and motorcycles. Teachers describe his teasing grin. His friends remember Carson as the one who would make sure a classmate whom no-one ever invited to birthday parties received an invitation to his party. His family shares his love of hip-hop, Legos, little brothers and a dog named Rex.
We educators in the audience know even young members of our school community leave deep footprints on our shared pathways. Shouldering the most intense burden of school leadership for the first time, a young principal lightens us with stories of Carson as seen through the eyes of his teachers and friends. We laugh and we cry. And with finality, Carson’s photo on the front page of a program touches upon who we are as a school community; and the value of the relationships we build with each young person in our care. We know children’s faces keep us in touch with why we chose this profession, reflecting the precious lives of those we teach, coach, nurture, and protect. They remind us to celebrate life and see hope for our future, even on this, our most challenging of days.
When a child dies, we renew the strength of our school community. We reach out to sustain each other in this most difficult of times, offering the best of ourselves to our school family. We realize the importance of our personal and professional care and support to our young people, our parents, and each other. Most importantly, we are reminded that who we are has always been, and will always be, so much more than teaching content to the young people we serve. And, as we reach out to support one another, our children learn from us the value of life and the importance of always being there for each other, no matter what.