Listen to your Auntie

Read at Jack's Memorial Service on Monday:

This is a message from Anna's Sister, Jack and Margaret's Auntie.

There is much more to say about Jack than I can possibly take the time for today. School friends remember him as smart and kind and funny and the life of the party. I’d like to tell you about the Jack I knew and loved and will celebrate for the rest of my life.

I have always marveled about how smart Jack was – he was an artist, a brilliant reader, a mathematician, and a serious student of the Bible. He was so gifted in so many ways. He loved creating stories and solving mental puzzles. During our last visit he and his mom solved a logic puzzle that the rest of the family had to Google to solve.

And as most of us know, Jack loved his Legos. Jack’s passion for Legos was bigger than life – they were not just a toy to him, but a creative element and a very likely future career. Even when he was very young, he built complicated sets that would challenge adults. My kids and I always thought that Jack would become an engineer or an architect. He was curious, careful, methodical, and tenacious in his studies and his relationships.

He was always conscious of doing the right thing, even when everyone around him didn't see things his way. In that way he could be very serious. But he also had a lightness about him. I understand that he could get silly at school, but the Jack I knew was the kid I would want my kids to hang around to keep them on the straight and narrow.

Things weren’t always easy for Jack, but as he grew into himself, he settled into a place of joy that I pray each one of us will find again someday. He was an authentically joyful person. We know that joy is different from happiness. I am not trying to paint Jack as constantly giddy. I am talking about a deeper joy despite circumstances. What a lesson. Jack found joy in school, his friends, baseball, his church and above all his family.

He so loved his Sister, Margaret. He knew Margaret was special…full of light and life and love. He knew he was blessed to be her brother. Jack never teased Margaret like other brothers do- he never took his little Sister for granted. He was Margaret’s partner, her playmate, her best friend, her protector and her comforter. She was all of these things to him, too. Margaret’s loss is immeasurable.

Jack was also such a gift to his cousins. He and Isaac loved late night talks about anything and everything. He wow-ed his cousin Caroline with his intelligence and humor. Jack was a great listener. He cared about them and who they were and what they loved. He became genuinely excited about their interests. He often put his own ideas and desires on the back burner to allow others center stage. And doing this made him happy, not jealous. This was the source of Jack’s unique joy – it came from his unusual ability to internalize the joy of others and keep it for himself. To let it become a part of him. He did not express envy in the face of others’ success, or boredom when people expressed interests he didn’t share. He was able to take on the joy of others and keep it for himself. Instead of allowing the joys and successes of others to diminish him, he allowed it to fill him up. Jack also was the joy of everyone who loved him.

This tremendous loss is ours, not Jack’s. I am confident that Jack is blessed and whole and perfect and finally getting all of his questions answered at the feet of his Savior. My prayer is that God will somehow redeem OUR loss in this life. I am desperate to find ways for Jack’s legacy to live on in my life. I am determined to find redemption in this heartbreak. …I am aiming high. In Jack’s honor, I want to-

Be kind. Jack was a gentle, loving and kind soul.

Pay attention. To details, to other people’s feelings, to God’s work in my life and in the world.

Think. Quiet time is time well-spent. Jack asked good questions and took this time to think through good answers. He also knew that some questions would not be answered in this life, but that contemplation has value anyway.

Play. Be creative, experiment, think things through from every angle and share my gifts with the world. When I enjoy something, I want to enjoy it BIG. And play together. Throw a ball in the yard, even if the to-do list beckons. Snuggle and chat at bedtime, even if it is late.

Never give up. Focus on my call, my art, my joy, my task and see it through.

Be patient. Good things are worth waiting for.

Internalize the joy of others. I pray that God will help me learn to do what Jack did…. To find my own joy in the joy of others. I want to relish other people’s happiness regardless of my own circumstances, like Jack did. My beloved nephew Jack was unimaginably selfless for a 12 year old. Jack found the secret to lasting joy. Borrow it from others and keep it forever.

In closing, I will tell you one last lesson we can learn from Jack’s life. I believe that Jack’s ability to find joy was a gift given to him by his parents. There is no parent on Earth who loves his or her child more than Tim and Anna love Jack and Margaret. Not a day of Jack’s life passed that they failed to tell him how much they loved him, how proud they were to be his parents. There is no child who felt more secure in his parents love than Jack did. He was taken from us too early, but somehow Anna and Tim filled a lifetime of love into Jack’s twelve years.

So Please- for our Jack –

Be Kind.
Pay Attention.
Think.
Play.
Never Give Up.
Share Others' Joy.

And every day- tell your loved ones how treasured they are.

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We'll talk. We'll talk about the regrets and what-ifs and the senses of foreboding. We'll talk about an ache so deep that it can't be named. We'll talk about the excruciating pain of looking at neighborhood kids playing outside my window today, on a day that is impossibly, infuriationgly sunny. And the feeling that I want to hug those kids so tightly, or scream at them because they are alive and my kid is dead. Or both. We'll talk about backpacks still on hooks and clothes in the laundry basket and favorite foods in the fridge. We'll talk about how my kids' blog names were different from their real names so no one would come murder us in our beds. We'll talk about how I really don't give a shit about that now. We'll talk about news cameras. We'll talk about neigbhors holding us up when we couldn't stand. But for today, my friends, when THERE ARE NO WORDS, I'll share with you what I read at Jack's service yesterday. Because, though spread far and wide, though we may not have met in person, you ARE my friends, my people. And when I was speaking in the church, I was speaking to you too. I love you.

"It’s impossible to sum up what Jack meant to us, and I know you understand that. Some of you knew him from school days where he was lively and fun and, if rumors are correct, where he may have driven at least one preschool teacher into early retirement. Some knew him through church, scouts and baseball, where he was quiet and reserved. Many of you are family and friends, who were able to see other sides to him, and some of you never had the chance to meet Jack at all. Thank you to those who have shared Jack stories with us. Please keep them coming.

Now we’d like to share a tiny bit of what he was like with us, in our family, in our HOME.

Jack was a witty, creative, sensitive and loving son. He loved the rituals of family life, whether it was holiday traditions such as going on a poem scavenger hunt to find his “big” present each Christmas, eating our annual Christmas Eve lunch at Chevy’s Mexican restaurant, staying until the very, very, very end of the Halloween Parade no matter the weather, or enjoying ice cream for breakfast on the first snow day of the year.

But he also enjoyed the simple, everyday rituals of family life such as always sitting in the same place in the balcony Sundays at church (POINT TO BALCONY), and discussing the Yankees box scores in the paper with his dad each morning. He loved the four of us squeezed together on the couch, our dog Shadow at our feet, as we watched our favorite shows. On weekends at dinner he would just say, “Tonight?” which was shorthand for “What are we going to do together tonight?” Jack loved this family. When he asked whether he could do something that we didn’t want him to, we just said, “That’s not what Donaldsons do.” And he didn’t argue about it. Not once.

You already know Jack’s passion was Legos, but he also enjoyed board games, doodling, logic puzzles, hot wheels cars and using his imagination to create clever games with his little sister. Those of you from school, fondly remember the games he made up just for YOU, and the strange, new words and phrases he introduced into your vocabulary like STEBE and “What the Johnny?” Thank you for letting Jack be Jack. He loved you.

You will hear a lot today in conversations about how funny Jack was, and he did keep us laughing at home, but you may be surprised to hear he was not a natural clown or even an optimist. Jack faced personal challenges that made certain situations quite difficult for him. Sometimes he wanted to be a more happy- go-lucky kid, like those he saw around him. I’ll never forget when he said to me, “Mom, “I know I’m a glass half-empty kind of guy, but I’m trying to be more glass half-full.” And he never quit trying.

I remember telling him, when he was very upset about something, “Your emotions may seem too powerful to you, and that is hard, but they are part of what makes you YOU. I love you, I love the way you are made, and I am proud to be your mom.” During these times of struggle he never said, “Why me?” but instead leaned on his special verse from the Bible, “Nothing is Impossible With God.”

Jack loved his neighborhood, and was a homebody at heart. We decided to cancel our pool membership because Jack just couldn’t be bothered with going ALL THE WAY across town to the pool. When his dad and I talked of getting a new house someday, Jack said we shouldn’t, because we could never find a neighborhood as nice as ours. His happiest memories this summer were playing with the neighborhood kids and his sister, whether it was soccer in the Smith’s yard, playing Manhunt at night, having lemonade stands, or swimming in the neighbors’ pools. I think he would be proud of how our neighborhood has come together to show so much love to our broken little family during this horrible week.

Jack was a great big brother to Margaret. One of his favorite things about our annual beach trip was getting to share a room with her. He thought she was cool. He appreciated how she wasn’t a “girly girl” and would gladly play pretty much whatever he dictated. They had very different, yet complimentary personalities—vivacious Margaret and more serious Jack, a little like their Mom and Dad, you know?

Often, when he wanted to see if someone in the neighborhood could play, he brought Margaret out as a scout to do the talking for him. She also tried to help keep him organized by helping him turn in permission slips that otherwise would have sat in his backpack for a month. I think they knew each other better than most siblings do. Margaret was constantly giving Jack unsolicited advice about his hair. Speaking of hair, let’s pause to remember Jack’s great head of hair. Margaret and I liked for him to keep it short, so we could always see that cute little part in the front that we called “Jack’s Floop.”

We were so happy to have the kids in the same school so they could be together and share those memories. It’s something that helped keep our family close. We were looking forward to 2 more years with them together at school. This year I asked if Jack would tutor Margaret in Latin. I offered to pay him $1 to tutor her, and pay her $1 to PUT UP with him as a tutor.

The most tender part of the day for Jack and his dad was their evening catch in the yard when they talked about his Lego creations, their fantasy baseball team, and the Yankees.

The most tender part of the day for Jack and me was bedtime, when we would snuggle in the dark. This is when he would open up and really talk about important issues. Each night, whether it had been a great day or a hard day, ended with my telling Jack how much we loved him and how very proud we were to be his parents.

And we were, ALWAYS-- he was so quirky, and tender and gentle toward us. The whole family got excited about what Jack was excited about, whether it was playing Macbeth in the school play, or trying to predict who would win America’s Got Talent.

Our time with Jack was too, too short, but I’d like to tell you a story about some bonus time I got with Jack that I cherished. One summer I was driving Jack to camp in Pennsylvania. When we pulled up at the gates, there was no one there. NO ONE. I looked at Jack and I was about to cry, because I had gotten the day wrong! He gave me a HUGE smile—a cross between “my mom is a nutcase” and “hey, this is pretty cool!” We got to spend a day and ½ hanging out in a little Pennsylvania town together, having rare one on one time, and we even went to Frank Llyod Wright’s Fallingwater, a dream for Jack, the budding architect. Bonus time. Precious time.

You’ve heard that Jack was a deep thinker. He wondered about a lot of things. In fact, as a five year old he said the first thing he would ask God when he died was why the heck He created mosquitoes. I think he knows now. The rest of us will just have to wait.

I want to tell you that the concept of eternity scared Jack. It just seemed, well, a little too long to him. Then, 2 years ago at summer camp, he had a conversation with his counselor. They discussed heaven and eternity in a way that helped Jack to stop being afraid. In fact, he was excited about heaven! He didn’t understand why people were afraid to die because he truly believed that there was no better place.

Sometimes at funerals, people tend to portray the person who died as perfect. Jack, who consistently insisted on the truth, would not have approved. We would all agree that Jack was NOT a perfect person, nor are you, nor am I. We do not have to be. But we do know Jack was an amazing, generous, gentle, loving child who blessed our lives and was the PERFECT son for this family.

Our handsome Jack, our sweet boy, died in a tragic, senseless accident. We all wish we could turn back the clock. Our hearts are breaking for what could have been.

But you know what? We truly believe our homebody Jack is HOME now, in a better HOME than any of us could ever imagine."

For more about the service, please see my friend Glennon's blog.

Our Beloved Son

His Life Verse: "Nothing is Impossible with God." Luke 1:37