When I asked for John Hoover...

The world lost a little bit of light today.I first met this wonderful kid and his equally amazing parents 6 years ago in Long Beach California. Wyatt was driving and I was using Wyatt's cell to find out exactly where we should park the car near their condo. I asked for John Hoover when Carrie answered the phone, in the background I heard her say "some woman is calling asking for John" and then she got back on the phone and asked me if I was sure I had the right number! So I hung up! I called back and at this point Wyatt told me to just ask for "Hoover" which I did and John got on the phone. He gave us directions and then explained that no one really asked for him by his name anymore. If they asked for John it was in reference to their son John. :)

I was completely unprepared for the smiles and continual acceptance of everything life threw in their laps. I still remember asking to feed John still afraid of feeding babies much less this little one so fragile and so beautiful. Then he started sucking his bottle down and I realized he may look fragile but he wasn't in spirit or mind. He's been that way his whole life.

Wyatt's tribute to John Douglas Hoover II is below.
For more than 20 years, one of my most cherished friends has been my high-school best friend, John Hoover. I often tease John about his remarkable child-like whimsy that has been perpetual into his 40's. Without (often) falling into immaturity, John reminds me how to view the world through the same inquisitive, joyful, imaginative perspective as a child. The word "unique" can be defined as (adj....) exceptional, (adj.) curious, or (adj.) atypical, and John lives up to all three in a way that arrests me with laughter. This morning, I send my love and compassion to John and his wife Carrie at the news of the death of their 6-year-old son, John Douglas Hoover II. John II's loss was not sudden, he was born three months premature and perennial complications and cancer followed. John and I would usually talk about the issue only superficially; with Wylie so close to John II in age, John was always facing a nightmare that stupefied me with fear. As someone who spends a lot of time with my foot in my mouth, I never could think of what to say that couldn't be turned ominous because, while I can sympathize with John, I was too scared to empathize with him. This was never a issue, there were always fantastical stories of John II to discuss instead; John II was truly his father's son, refusing to yielding his childhood and happiness to adversity. It is my firm belief that a child's personality is learned and, from his parents, John II had nothing but love, joy and maybe a little deviousness to mirror back to the world. Whether at Disney World or in a hospital, there are only two kinds of photos of John II…those with him smiling and those with him napping. For nearly seven incomparable years, as improbable as it seems to me, the world was graced with two silly, chortling, scheming John Hoovers and now it has lost a disproportionate amount of exuberance.


If nothing else today, hug your children, hug your family, pass a little smile and love onto the person who doesn't look so happy on the bus or in the supermarket. We never know what someone is facing but it only takes a moment to be kind. We need to remember to be curious, interested, and not always typical.