dear porter,

we did it.
we waited until the snow melted,
and we went to face your mountain.
my stomach hurt when we pulled into the parking lot
as i looked up at the cliff and pictured you standing up there.
and then pictured you falling.
which i really shouldn't have done.
but i couldn't help myself.

dave and brian came with us,
which made it a lot easier.
we hiked to the base of the cliff
where dad found you.
i wanted to stop everyone that passed us on the trail,
even though they were strangers.
i wanted to tell them what happened here.
i wanted them to know that it was a special place.
it didn't seem right for them to pass on by,
never knowing.

we searched everywhere for your shoe
and your glasses.
especially your glasses.
for some reason, it was so important to us to find them.
they were the last things you were wearing.
a small piece of you.

we almost gave up ever thinking we would find them.
there was so much brush
and so many rocks.
so much junk...
waterbottles,
trash,
tv's and scrap metal?
people who threw them off the cliff
as a joke.
its funny how you view things after something like this happens.

dad found your shoe first.
maybe 50 feet from where your body was.
how did it get that far?
maybe i don't want to know the answer to that.
but we were so glad it was still there.

we finally gave up on the glasses.
we thought they would be in a million little pieces.
glasses don't survive a fall like that.
just as we were about to leave,
dad glanced down,
and there they were.
in one piece.
a miracle, right up against the cliff wall.
our only logical conclusion is that they fell off
before you landed.
we will never know what really happened that day.
but miracles don't need logic.

a friend of yours shared a conversation she had with you

it was one you had on instant messenger.

ironically, about death.

and she had saved it on her computer,

back in august 2009.

you had dreamed you were dying

and you had been reading about the life after this one.

you told her you thought it would be a 

"peaceful beautiful thing."

that you believed family and friends greet you on the other side

and take you to a perfect place,

and that

"living here is only a tiny part of our huge adventure."

we can't wait to continue that adventure with you.

love you.