girl he loved and chose and saved, giving me a reason to keep going exactly like he promised.
Here’s what I learned, reading my dying son’s letter at his own funeral.
Love, real love, plans for your absence. My son was nineteen and facing his own death, and the thing he spent his last strength on was not fear, not anger, not saving himself — it was making sure his mother would never be alone. He looked past his own ending and built a family on the other side of it, for me, so that when he was gone, I’d have somewhere to put the love that had nowhere else to go. That’s not something death can defeat. A love that arranges your future from beyond its own grave is the strongest thing there is.
My son donated his heart to an 18-year-old girl.
He chose her.
Not for her —
