Dear Todd,
I meant to write this letter to you a couple months ago. My plan was to give it to you when I came for your celebration of life. The one that I was expecting to see you at, for the last time. The universe had other plans and your plan to attend your own celebration of life did not come to fruition. This letter sat in my head as these months after you left us have ticked away. My heart has been heavy lately and so I am sitting down to write this letter to you now. My hope is that the afterlife will allow you to see this somehow.
I am so glad that our paths crossed all those years ago in first or second grade. When I think back on memories of my youth, quite often you are there. Not only were you there but you stayed there consistently until we graduated high school. Thank you for being my friend through those years. The elementary school years were easy. We went to school, played sports, jumped on your trampoline, rollerbladed, swam, and did all the things kids do. The foundation was set. You were always a good kid, someone who could be trusted, the kid my parents were ok with me being around.
Middle school was when things started to get different. We hit puberty, our voices cracked, we got acne and things were just awkward, but we made it through in one piece.
Then came high school, the time that would find our friendship going through all the major milestones one does during those teenage years. Our voices didn’t crack as much anymore, they got deeper. Our acne got worse. We started to like girls more. We got our learners permits and then our drivers licenses. The coming of age story that was our life hit a pivotal time. The memories listed before this were special, there was an innocence to them, but the memories from ages 15 to 18 were the ones that I have thought about the most in these last few months.
We went through the standard things that teenagers do, but of course at the time they seemed life altering. The highs were high and the lows felt like the world was ending. Who was at my side through all of those? It was you and a couple others of course, but consistently it was you. The trips to Wendy’s to eat Baconator’s, the movies at Sonoran Village and Shea 14, the cheering on of our friends as they played the sports that we wished we could play with them. We both took Accutane and both navigated all the side effects labeled on the box that seemed to hit us pretty hard. We took drives in your blue Jeep. The one that you could take the key out of at any time, even when the car was running. We drove just to drive most of the time. The soundtrack of our youth blaring through those speakers. Wheetus, Can’t Hardly Wait Soundtrack, Brittany Spears, Garth Brooks and of course Vanilla Ice. At one point in time we rode in a car together for the last time, we didn’t know it, but it happened.
You were so funny, and smart. Your ability to quote movie lines is something I still do to this day and I do think you are a big reason for that. The same kid in elementary school who was kind and well behaved, stuck around. He got better. He got more responsible and at the same time got more goofy. You were good, and you made those around you good too.
I recently re-read all the things you wrote in my high school yearbooks. They were funny and long and in your horrific handwriting. Most importantly, they were from the heart. They brought back so many of the memories we shared during those times. The jokes, the girls we had crushes on, the work you did at Amer-X and so much more.
We eventually graduated from high school and our long tenured friendship would change from there. Not in a bad way. In the way that close bonds like that typically do, by two people taking different paths. Although those paths didn’t cross a ton after those years, the foundation stayed.
We saw each other a few times throughout the years and each time it was like no time had passed at all. And of course, you were still you, but on a different level. You were a husband and a father, and so much more.
The news of your cancer diagnosis was a shock. The thing you never want to hear from a friend. In true Todd fashion, you brought humor, detail, determination, and most importantly hope to your updates. When we had lunch that time you were in town, you filled me with optimism that you would beat this thing. I didn’t fully think it would be the last time I’d see you. It was. A full circle moment I guess. Similar to the day we unknowingly took our last drive together, but this time I was somewhat aware it could have been the last time, and unfortunately it was. There will be no more memories made, that is true, but there are so many that will live on in my head and my heart.
Your celebration of life was beautiful. It was perfect. It was you. It was funny. I cried. I laughed. most importantly, it helped fill in the gaps of the Todd I didn’t know after those high school years. The son, brother, husband, father, friend, and man who fought with everything he had until the very end. I was able to see the kid I grew up with as the man he became. The man who filled a theater with people who loved him. The man who lived a good life, the man who saw the world, the man who thrived in a career, the man who loved his family with all of his being and the man who leaves a huge hole in this world without his presence.
I am so glad I knew you. My life is better because you were in it. You showed me what friendship can be. You showed me that friendship doesn’t have to be forever physically, but the memories made live on in ways that have a tremendous impact years later. At your celebration of life your wife said something that has stuck with me. She said that a person is believed to die twice, once when they physically die and the second time when their name is spoken for the last time. Sitting in that room and seeing all those people whose lives you touched, that second death for you won’t happen for a very long time, if ever. I make you this promise, as long as I live, I will do everything I can to continue to say your name.
Thank you for being my friend, for being there for me, for making so many memories together in those formative years. I’m hoping this letter reaches you in the afterlife, and you use your powers to send me down a sign that you read it. I’ll be keeping an eye out. Save a seat for me at the big Wendy’s in the sky, I can’t wait to have a baconator with you again.You were a great man, and I will miss you. I love you Todd.
Your Friend,
Chris