Jeff's Side of Events

Happy Birthday April!!! It is seven weeks ago today that Taylor died. In some ways it seems like we have been stuck in this horror forever and in other ways I can't believe it has been that long since I have seen Taylor. Saturday's are bad days because of it being the day it happened, and also because we got to see him on Saturday's---well, that is if he made time for us :). Sometimes he thought we were just plain boring. I would ask him why can't you stay home like Brooke---he came back with an answer I had to laugh----He said--Oh, mom Brooke does not have a life. He had a short life, but he made every moment count.

I am writing now, what Jeff has told me about these days for him. We had left for Illinois on Thursday and Taylor was on summer break from school for two weeks and as happy as could be. He was never one to like school all that much. He did love the classes that was in the shop working on tractors, trucks and whatever they worked on, but when it came to the academic classes----he was bored silly and was probably looking out the window day dreaming of when he could be riding his four wheeler again. He had just finished some of his academic classes before break, so this made summer break even better for him. That Thursday night, Jeff, Taylor and one of his buddies were here helping Jeff clean up some stuff from a sale and they had a big fire going. When Brooke called from Illinois to tell Jeff we had arrived safely, she said dad is having a good time with Taylor---she said dad is laughing at Taylor and his bud. Taylor stayed home that night and spent time with Jeff which was a rare thing for Taylor to stay home the whole evening. Friday was a fairly normal day. Taylor went to work, Jeff was getting ready for a sale. Saturday Taylor worked until noon, then went to Jeff's sale for awhile. Sometimes Tay would help Jeff, but I think today he just stopped in to see how the sale was going. Taylor was home when Jeff got home from his sale. Of course Taylor was always working or doing something to his 4 wheeler. Jeff asked Tay to stay home with him that evening and help him clean up the shed some. Tay loved to work on things, but never seemed to have a love to put this tools and stuff away, so Jeff thought he could spend some time with Tay and get the shed cleaned up too. Tay says to Jeff, "Oh dad it is such a nice night, I want to go out and see some of my friends tonight. So, he left about 8:30 or so. Weeks after this all happened, one day I picked up his phone and decided to look at this texts. I went to that fateful day and read through them. He was making plans for that evening with his friends---they were meeting at a farm to have a bon fire. It was a strange feeling reading his last text when somebody asked him where are you, are you coming soon. He answered back. "I am on my way". Then I seen on his texts where he had made plans for the next day and even the next week. I had to think, God had very different plans for Taylor. At probably about 10:30 or so, I really do not know the exact time. These kids were at a farm at a bon fire, when they decided to go to a different farm. There were several guys on 4-wheeler going to the other farm. Some of them had passengers on the back. Taylor and his roommate---Jake Masters--were on his. Taylor was behind the others, but knowing Tay he did not like being last, so he thought he would pass the other kid. It was dark and the lights on the 4wheelers are not all that great, so Tay could not see all that well. Tay hit the back tire of the 4-wheeler in front of him and started to lose control. He went off into the ditch, but the ditch was not that deep, so Tay just straddled it. The kids say he was in the ditch for 100 to 150 ft, then at the last minute he probably seen the culvert. It is a huge under the road culvert. As Tay tried to pull his four wheeler out---he almost made it---his back tire caught the cement part of the culvert. When Tay's bike caught that culvert, it flipped him over into the ditch, which was much deeper and had two rocks beside a little stream. Taylor was flipped into the that ditch and he hit his head on one of the rocks. Jake was thrown over the ditch and landed in the field and ended up with only a scratch on his head. I wanted to just scream why could not Taylor have been thrown into the field, or even land in the deep ditch, but why did he have to hit the rock, but I had to hang onto the thought once again-----God was in control---He never makes a mistake---and nothing can happen without going through God's hands---I had to hang onto this thought with both hands----I will tell you more about this on the day that I finally went to visit his sight. Anyway back to Jeff. About 12:10 his cell phone rings. He is asleep or just going to sleep. At first he did not think all that much about it, because Taylor had a habit of, but usually through texts, asking if he could stay out later, or maybe stay all night at a friends house. Tay was always good at letting us know where he was when it was time for him to be coming home. But when Jeff opened his cell phone and seen it was a call from Kathy Marty, his heart started to pound because he knew this was not a good thing. Kathy Marty's daughter and Tay were best friends and always or alot of the time were together. When he picked it up, She says you need to get to the Dunlap Hospital right away Taylor was in an accident. She said her and her husband would follow Jeff to the hospital. I asked Jeff later what was going through his mind. He said he thought Taylor was hurt, and maybe now he had learned his lesson and would want to get rid of his 4 wheeler----Jeff hated that thing, and I must say I really didn't like it either. I knew it was dangerous, but I really did not think Taylor would end up getting killed on it. Kathy said she just thought too, he had some broken bones and be in the hospital for a while. They got to the hospital right after the ambulance got there. They already had Taylor in the ER. Jeff and the Marty's walk into the ER and Jeff asks how is Taylor, the nurse says it is not good. Then Kathy and Jeff walk down the hall in the ER to Taylor's room. Jeff said the curtain was open a couple of feet. He says when they walk in, a doctor is on one side of Taylor and a nurse on the other side. The doctor looks at Jeff and slowly shakes his head and says "I am so sorry". They don't remember it, but people in the waiting room said they both started to scream. Jeff stays with Taylor---Jeff said Taylor looked just like he was sleeping, just alittle blood on his teeth and little blood in his ears. Kathy goes back out into the waiting room where lot of the kids from the bon fire had come to see which bone Taylor had broken. Taylor was accident prone, so the kids were not too surprised he was in the hospital ER. Kathy says she can barely remember what happened next, she does remember going back out to the waiting room and falling to her knees and saying he is gone. Of course the kids were in shock and hysterical. Jake Master the one on with Taylor and also Taylor's roommate at college ran outside-----they had to go looking for him. Some of these kids mom and dad's came to be with their kids. Kathy tells Jeff you need to call your family, so I am not sure who he called first, but Barb, Dave, Bev, Randy, Neil, Jer, Ellen all came. After Jeff made that horrible call to us in Illinois, Diane called Max and told him to go with Jeff at the hospital. Rachel Miller had already Texted Amber and told her, so she got up and went to her dad's, so they both came to the hospital to be with Jeff. They all went back into the room where Taylor was and stood around the bed. Amber said too, Taylor looked like he was sleeping, so much so that Jeff would say, "come on Taylor get up it is time to go home." His mind also was going into shock. Barb told me later that as she stood around that bed looking at Taylor a real peace came over her. At the time she said she could not figure out why that would be, here is Taylor dead and she had this peace. She said she did not tell anyone about it at first, but she said after she heard what God had shown me and Amber, she then understood the peace. God had Taylor home with Him. Later they went outside to wait for the corner to come and pronounce him dead. Barb said as they stood outside nobody saying a word, it was very silent except for the locust. She said the corner came out went over to Jeff and said " I am so sorry, the only thing I seen was a broken neck" then got into her car and left. Her job was done, but our lives have been changed forever. Barb said they just stood there in silence. They all offered either to take Jeff home with them or have somebody come and stay the rest of the night with him, which I am not sure what time it was by now, but probably getting close to morning. Jeff chose to go home by himself. He said he needed time by himself. He knew people would soon be coming to our house, but "our" house was a total disaster. Brooke had just totalled her car the week before. She could have also been killed, but as we can see very clearly God has the date of our birth and the date of our death all marked out before we are even born. Her work here on earth is not yet finished. A little side note----when she had her accident on the Saturday before---I had texted Taylor and told him about it. He responded very quickly with a phone call to get the details and then he came home soon after. I remember him going upstair into the bathroom where Brooke was and giving her a big hug saying I am so glad you are alright. We were so thankful that she was not hurt any worse than a few bruises and scrapes, but little did we know that exactly one week later Taylor would be killed. Again, what was God doing-----nothing is by circumstances, He has a plan for every thing. We have thought on this and I will give our thought on this later. Anyway, back to Jeff. We had to clean out Brooke's SUV right away when they totalled it,they take it away from you---- and if you know Brooke she does not travel lightly---she was on her way home from MI when it happened. So, we dumped all the stuff in the middle of the livingroom. We had been gone the weekend before and I had little time to clean the house before we left for Illinois. It always enters my mind when we go away that if something happens people will be coming to our house, so I usually try to have it reasonably clean when I leave on a trip, but not this time. I done it a hundred times before and nothing ever happened. So, Jeff had to spend the rest of the night cleaning. Somewhere along the night, Jerry took Jeff over to where the bon fire was to get Taylor's truck and bring it home. That was a very hard thing to do, drive his truck home, knowing Taylor was in it only hours before. He put it way back under the trees in the back of our property, which is where it still is. I was thankful he did that, so it would not be the first thing we would see when we pulled into the drive. That pretty much wraps up the day for Jeff-----again a day that is a parent's worst nightmare. Jesus was weeping with us, but at those moments, we were too much in shock to feel him, but soon very soon, we realize there is no where to turn but to Jesus. Thank you all who are praying for us----please continue!