When I read or listen to the news, it’s hard to imagine there are any good people in this world. More and more the focus is on gun violence, hate crimes, and greedy rich people getting richer on the backs of others. The political environment provokes nausea in me. I want to scream, “Just stop. Stop this madness.”
I sat stewing in misery about the state of the world one day and I got a horrific email from a friend telling me about one of my former colleagues who had just lost her 18 year-old daughter to an aneurysm. It was as if a scream emanated from deep inside me. “No, no, no!”
But it was true.
The thing that haunts me more than anything is how decent and good and loving Chloe was. Why should she be the one to die?
In her 18 years she managed to bring happiness and smiles to hundreds of young people who suffered from mental and physical disabilities. Chloe championed inclusion. She was chosen as a youth ambassador to the Special Olympics in Washington State and in that capacity she was able to demonstrate to everyone that inclusivity is the way forward. Her work with challenged youth was her passion, and she had recently been accepted to the college of her choice and planned to become a special education teacher.
Why should she be the one to die?
At her memorial service we heard stories of how her light shone on everyone she met. If a kid at her school was having a bad day, she’d stop and offer a kind word, a hug, a smile. And Chloe’s big, sunny smile was the reason her friends called her the Sunflower Girl.
Imagine a sunflower, and how every petal is bright and glowing around a center of the tiny black-brown disk flowers in the center, that grow in a spiral and mature into sunflower seeds. These seeds will make more flowers. Don’t we all get a little happy looking at a tall sunflower? And a field of them fills us all with joy, right?
Well, that’s what our Sunflower Girl did. She worked with young people who needed to feel seen. Who wanted to fit in. Whose hearts were aching to be included. And Chloe showed us how to make that happen.
Her voice will continue to be heard. Her light will continue to shine. She planted the seeds of inclusion so that we would find a way to offer ourselves to the task in big and small ways. When we are confronted with someone who may feel only “otherness,” we can offer our hands, our smiles, our hearts, our time.
Let’s be the good people we wish to see in this world. Let’s be like Chloe, the Sunflower girl, and choose to include.
