compassion | Life After Ted

“Dad…remembering you is easy, I do it every day. Missing you is the heartache that never goes away.” – unknown

mike schwer When you’re 5 years old, the biggest obstacle in your life should be the playground monkey bars. You shouldn’t have to worry about money, your health, what you’re having for dinner or how you’re getting to school in the morning. These should be the concerns and talking points for the adults in your life. But, as the adults, we know, and sometimes children are quick to learn, that life doesn’t always follow the path or pattern we imagine. The hard reality is that life isn’t fair. It hands us lemons. Sometimes, it goes one step further, and hands us heartache and disappointment.

In October of 2008, life handed my Little Sister, Hannah, the biggest heartache it could when it took her father from this earthly world and out of her sight and reach. After a short battle with cancer, Hannah’s father, Michael Schwer, died. This loss came just a couple of months after Hannah’s fifth birthday. A time when Hannah should have been celebrating first days of school, laughing and enjoying trick or treating and looking forward to the upcoming soccer season, she was faced with the daunting reality of this hole in her heart. (The above photograph shows Hannah hugging her dad after a soccer game.)

The amazing thing is – she persevered.

Hannah’s first soccer coach, Michael Schwer passed on to his dear daughter, his love of the sport, his bravery, his tenacity, his compassion and his perseverance. The lessons Hannah learned from her dad didn’t come through direct instruction, but through the beautiful way in which he lived his life.

In the field coaching just two weeks before he died, Michael Schwer showed Hannah the importance of never giving up – no matter who or what your opponent.

Honoring her father’s memory and legacy, Hannah follows her brave father’s lead, and faces life’s obstacles with a determination and hard-headedness that keeps propelling her forward. That’s not to say that it wasn’t difficult for Hannah in the days, months or years after her father’s passing. It was and remains a hard reality to manage. But Hannah has learned from it and has tried to create a positive response to a devastating outcome. According to Hannah’s mother, “She was my one kid out of all of my kids who wouldn’t open up about it.” Hannah went to a few programs for children who had lost parents but had difficulty communicating her experience to others. The first time she really had a breakthrough came when one of her elementary school classmates lost a parent. Hannah came to that student’s side, offering a compassion and empathy that only a child who had that shared experience could. She has since reached out to other children who have found themselves in a similar circumstance. As Hannah’s mom described, “Hannah makes herself available to them – just to tell them that if they need to talk or to be with someone who really understands – she will be there.” Not only has Hannah persevered, but she has used her loss and her hurt to help someone else. She has transformed her pain into a purpose, a feat that puts me in awe of my Little Sister.

She honors her dad through her perseverance. She reaches her dad through her soccer play and by connecting with those who once knew him. Throughout his coaching career, Michael Schwer mentored several Olympic athletes including Lori Chalupny and Becky Sauerbrunn. Hannah has stood in line for hours in order to meet these players – seeking any kind of information or insight they might share about her dad. After hours waiting to meet Lori Chalupny, Hannah’s persistence earned a priceless reward when Lori told her, “Michael Schwer was one of my favorite people – one of the best people I ever knew.” As joyful as these meetings are, they bring with them a bittersweet reality that these players knew Hannah’s dad longer than she did.

Hannah facial features resemble her dad’s. Her second toe is longer than her big toe – just like her dad. And she has this unrelenting spirit to keep moving in a positive direction, no matter what, just like her dad. Josh Shipp once said, “Perseverance is stubbornness with a purpose.” Hannah embodies that quote.

Hannah has faced unimaginable loss and change and hardships with grace and humility and a stubbornness to not let anything stop her from reaching her goals and aspirations. Consequently, she gets straight As, plays on two soccer teams, is very involved in youth group at church and is a proud and loving friend, daughter, sister, aunt and granddaughter.

Determined and often a perfectionist, Hannah gives 110 percent no matter what. Some will do the bare minimum – just what they can to get by. That’s not who she is. Hannah gives her best effort. Sometimes when Hannah is up late working on her homework, her mom has to remind her to get some sleep. “It’s just a rough draft – remember?” Her mom says.

Knowing what she knows about the fragility and uncertainty of life, Hannah lives her life always striving to be and do her best. There are no rough drafts for this feisty and resolute 6^th grader.

“With ordinary talent and extraordinary perseverance, all things are attainable.” –Thomas Foxwell Buxton. I believe this about Hannah. I can’t wait to see where she goes!

(Editor’s Note: Hannah is my Little Sister through Big Brothers Big Sisters of Eastern Missouri.)

I love Humans of New York (HONY). Initiated in the summer of 2010 by Brandon Stanton, HONY is a photoblog and bestselling book featuring pictures and interviews with people of New York City. According to Stanton, he started HONY because he “thought it would be really cool to create an exhaustive catalogue of New York City’s inhabitants.” His initial goal was to photograph 10,000 New Yorkers and plot their photos on a map.

“Somewhere along the way, I began to interview my subjects in addition to photographing them. And alongside their portraits, I’d include quotes and short stories from their lives,” Stanton explains, adding, “Taken together, these portraits and captions became the subject of a vibrant blog. HONY now has over ten million followers on social media, and provides a worldwide audience with daily glimpses into the lives of strangers on the streets of New York City.”

The pictures are beautiful. The copy, which is generally just a couple of sentences, is powerfully honest and often emotion evoking.

HONY is compelling, relatable and revealing. And some how, some way, HONY seems to really bring out the best in the people who follow it.

I follow HONY on Facebook. Not long ago, there was a picture and interview with a young man who reminisced about his deceased father. This young man shared that he didn’t have a close relationship with his dad because while the family had routines, they never really had conversations. He added, “During the last year of (my dad’s life), when he was really sick, he played solitaire in his office for six hours a day. My main memory of him is his silhouette reflecting off the wall of the corridor by the light of his computer screen.” There are more than 1,300 comments in response to this single post. For the most part, the comments seek to reassure. They are filled with compassion and encouragement. Someone named Ry Runge, for example, posted, “I’m sure he loved you more than you will ever know.” And yet another person commented, “Sorry for your pain.”

For this post and almost every HONY post, the comments are a validation, of sorts. The comments let the profiled person know: I see you. I hear you. I care about you.

The pictures and interviews by themselves are amazing. But when combined with the frank and sensitive comments left by fellow humans, the photoblog in its entirety is really a thing of beauty.

I know there are bigger stories around HONY. There is the picture and interview with a young student that inspired the $1.4 million fundraising campaign for his Brooklyn Middle School. I’m also aware of Humans of St. Louis and a related story of a community pulling together to support a family that is working to restore a dilapidated home. But it’s the more personal and tender moments that have captured my attention. I’m not sure why.

What I do know is that we all too frequently focus on what’s wrong with the world, our communities and ourselves. It’s uplifting to see such positive and tender interactions between humans.

I’ll also assert that through HONY, Stanton reminds us of our capacity to support and encourage our fellow humans and he fosters opportunities to demonstrate that capacity via “Likes,” “Comments,” and “Shares.” As Humans of Wherever, we have been afforded that same opportunity. It’s up to us to take advantage of it.

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