I didn’t know that it was possible to get a pain in your chest when something bad happens, even if it happens 20 miles away. But I did. Waking up in a jolt of fear, my chest got heavy and i began to feel dizzy. My parents, with eyes puffy and hands trembling, told me what had happened. I never would have thought that I’d awake to find out something so devastating. I started thinking of all the memories we made throughout our childhood. Would he remember me? Would he remember any of it? The thoughts that went through my head you overwhelming. It was almost... almost as though I was having a nightmare, but I was awake. What a sick joke. How could they do this to me? It was just a bad dream, i knew it wasn’t real.

I looked at my parents with confusion on my face and fear in my eyes. I was convinced that I would soon wake up and everything would be a nightmare. A real nightmare, like the one you have when you’re asleep. Not like the one that I was having, where it’s in real life and you’re awake, and denying the fact that it’s reality. I looked at the clock, it read 6:23 AM. “When did it happen?”, I asked. My mom looked at me with an intense stare. “About three hours ago. We got the news from your uncle and decided that we needed to tell you before you heard it from somebody else”, explained my mother. After she told me this, reality began to set it. I finally felt it, a tear rolled slowly down my cheek and hit my hand. It’s not a joke like I thought it was.

We skipped church that day and instead, went out to their house. When we pulled up, I saw Aunt Shelly and my cousin, Piper. They were surrounded by people I had never seen before. There had to be at least 20 cars in the driveway. Piper, and Aunt Shelly saw me and I ran to them. With everybody mourning around me, all I wanted was to see my Uncle Don. “Where is Uncle Don?”, I asked with a shakey voice. “He is in the back, I bet he’d like to see you. We have all been worried about you most.”, replied my aunt. After hearing this, I ran through the house and right through the back door. He looked up and I saw his puffy, red, tired eyes and I jumped into him arms. Somewhere through his shakey voice, I heard him whisper “I’m sorry”. I didn’t know what he was apologizing for but I just continued to hug him. “I hate that you have to see me like this. You’re like my daughter. You and Joshua were so close, I’m just sorry. I shouldn’t have let him go out last night. I should have made him stay. This would have happened if-” I interuped him. “Uncle Don this is not you’re fault. He was doing what you taught him to do. He was helping where help was needed and you need to be proud of him and not blame yourself. He died doing what God sent him out to do.”

After we both calmed down and got our emotions under control, I convinced my Uncle Don to go out front and visit with the people who came to see him. When we got out front there were tables of food set up. Everybody was sitting around, eating, laughing, and remembering all the good times that we had with Josh. That all we could do what was remember him and all the good things he did.



In Loving Memory of Joshua Don Kaluniak.