We woke to a warm wind outside.. it was almost 53 degrees out… impossible weather for this time of year .

It was nearly 60 degrees warmer than 2 days ago.. what a funny place we live.

I had a busy and surprisingly productive day at work.. Not much newsworthy there. The interesting part of my day came after work. I joined our friend Jim in speaking to a Drivers’ Ed class at Essex High School. Jim has given this talk in about 1000 classrooms..

Jim’s daughter Andrea was a senior at MMU when she was killed in a traffic accident about a quarter mile from her house. She wasn’t wearign a seatbelt becuase it had jammed as she tried to put it on. Andrea was a tripple organ donor..

Jim uses Andrea’s death to talk to kids about the improtance of seat belet usage and of the importance of having the organ donation conversation with you families.

Jim had brought his freind Chris with him. Chris is a kidney and pancreas transplant recipient. Before his transplant, Chirs was near death on dailey diyalisis.. Now he runs marathons in honor of organ donations. Here he’s holding the  Us olympic torch that he carried in the Salt Lake City Olypic opening ceremony in honro of the cause.

I’d met Chris first when Diane Gabe. Max and I had gone into MMU once with Jim.. it was just two weeks after Sam’s death. ‘ll never forget what it was like to talk to kids who knew Sam about the gift of organ donation.

Today I told the students abotu Sam.. and abotu the improtance of driving carfully..and about being alert to pedestrians. I tlaked about Sam’s accident and the steps up to and after his donation.
In a wonderful ‘coincidence’ just yesterday we received a wonderful and moving letter from one of the surgical nurses who assisted at Sam’s donation . I started to read it in the class tonight.. but I couldn’t get through it without crying too hard..   .. I’m posting it here for the kids .. and others to see. I’ve only removed the nurses name

My name is ****** and I am a nurse who works at All Children’s
Hospital. In 11/2006 I was a new nurse working in the operating room
at ACH. I assisted in the surgery that helped to save the lives of
the four very sick people the day that Sam died. It was the first
organ donation I had ever done in my career. It was a very emotional
experience for me. I cried for hours. On that day, the day before
Thanksgiving, I thanked God that there are such selfless people in
this world who choose to donate organs so that others can live.  I
don’t think I will ever forget Sam’s name, face, or the thing he was
able to do that day, even though I never got to know him.  He has
made so much of an impact on my life and I want to thank you so much
for that. I am still working at ACH and I love what I do. I would
love to have a stone as a way to remember him, the patient of mine
who has touched my heart the most. With lots of love,
******

As we were filing out at the end of todays’ class I noticed a bag that Lou the teacher’s books were in..

It had Sam’s intials ‘SMC; on the side I asked whether those were his initals.. nope.. was it becasie he went to St. Mikes ? Nope.. He and his wife had found the bag in a bargin bin at LL beans’ in main. Someone had had i mnogramed, then returned it due to a small tear. Lou baught it for a few bucks even though the intials didn’t mean anything to him…

He gave me the bag 🙂

Sam is everywhere…
OK.. all for now.. Goodnight my freinds, goodnight Sam..
-me