Life After Deaths, continued

This week, I received an invitation to a reception honoring recipients of the Christian A. Allenburger, IV Faculty Award. It's in the library of St. Andrew's Episcopal School in Jackson, Mississippi, where I taught from 1981-1998. Chris, an 8th grader who fell ill in December 1985 and died September 14, 1986, had an impact on my life that extends far beyond the fact that my first experience of a funeral was being pall bearer at his.

So, during this Easter season when four of my friends have passed away, it's fitting that I should be reminded of Chris. I'm sending this message with my regrets to the host of this week's reception:

I always feel grateful remembering Chris, Alex, and Susan. I was supposed to be Chris's teacher, but he taught me, as the threat to his life made him grow up in a hurry. He deflected attention from his own discomfort to put visitors at ease, and he listened intently to learn about life outside his hospital room. The last time I saw him, he encouraged me to follow my love of music whatever the cost -- and I started that year to study composition.

One day stands out for me when I remember that time. We had the day off from St. Andrew's, so I could visit Chris in the morning. He told me proudly that he no longer had any cancer cells in him. He was feeling so well that he invited me to stay for lunch, then to stay for a visit with his friend Payton, then to explore the hospital with both of them - wheeling Chris through a maze of hallways, and out to the helicopter pad. Alex and Susan invited me to stay for dinner, and it was special by any measure. They served all the staff on the floor with take-out from Ruth's Chris Steak House, somehow all the more delicious for being served in styrofoam boxes. During that dinner, Alex took me aside and gently explained the truth to me, that the poison killing the cancer cells was also killing Chris, and withdrawing the poison would permit the cancer to grow again. Chris's best hope for survival was his hope itself.

That dinner on the ward was a spontaneous sacrament. It was the outward sign of parents' love that nourished Chris's spiritual growth even while his body fought the disease, and a celebration of the community on that ward, and a sign of hope that a boy's life can continue to touch us beyond his death.

Because I cannot attend the reception, please relay my continued thanks and affection to the Allenburger family and the St. Andrew's community.