Worst and Greatest Day of My Life

Howdy Y'all,

One day at a time is what is given us, here in life. We have obstacles everyday. We can hit them head on, try to avoid them, or we can just accept them. We can not avoid them, if we try too they just come back bigger and stronger, with larger circumstances. We can just accept them and by the grace of God and the love of our family get through them.

A few years ago was one of the scariest of my life. That day made me realize how fragile life is. It was a day in July and I was getting ready to head to a rodeo in northern Indiana. This was on a Friday and it was the day before,when we got a phone call from my sister-in-law reminding me about my nephews birthday party on Saturday. This rodeo was no different than any other that I did all the time. My son and I would load up and go, he was 3 yrs old at this time. When I got off the phone my wife asked me what the call was about, I told her who it was and what it was about. I told her that our son would have more fun there than being at the rodeo in the 95 degree temperature and all the dirt. At the party he could swim and play and have a good time. He cried a little bit when we told him that he wasn't going with me.

I was up early and got ready to head out the door it was about 4:00 am when I hit the door. All of a sudden I stopped and ran up stairs to kiss him before I left. I kissed his cheek and whispered to him, I will always love you. I said that to him everyday since the day he was born. I then jumped the truck and headed north. about 4 hours later I arrived at the rodeo. When I got there everybody asked me where he was and I told them he was going to a birthday party that day.

All day long everything went on as normal without a hitch, but it felt a little different like something was missing. the day performance was over and had a little down time before the evening show. I checked my cell phone and I had a missed call, but I had No phone signal. I didn't pay much attention to it. I looked at my caller ID and it was my brothers phone number that came up. I just thought he was going to tell me that I was missing a good party.

The evening performance went on with out a problem, but still had that feeling that something was missing. I finished fighting bulls that night and as I walked out of the arena I heard the announcer call over the loud speaker ,that I had a phone call at the concession stand. So I headed that way, I got there and answered the phone.

It was my wife on the other end, and at that moment I felt a chill run through my body and went weak. As I said hello , the first thing I heard was Brody drowned in the pool. Immediately I collapsed and I started to cry. My whole world just ended and I had no control of it. People and friends started to gather around me. When I collapsed I dropped the phone and a really good friend picked it up and answered it. As i sat there on the ground, all i could think was that my little boy was gone and I could have stopped it. My world just ended and I would not make it through. Then the friend stuck the phone to my ear and my wife called my name and said it again. This time I heard everything she said, I missed the key point when she told me.
Brody drowned in the pool, but he is fine. then she said they were heading to her moms house. I still couldn't speak but I handed the phone back to the friend and headed to my truck and was headed to my in-laws house. By this time the people around me were in tears too and tried to stop me and I was fighting them to let me get to my truck. I had to get to my little boy and no body was going to stop me. The EMT's even blocked my truck in with the ambulance. I was furious and was cussing at them to get out of my way, my little boy needs me this is all my fault, get the f### out of my way. I gotta get to him. when another man grabbed a hold of me and sat me down on my tail gate and said stop there is nothing that you can do right now, and I was in no condition to drive. I was still cussing at them and telling them get out of my way, my little boy needs me. When Josh walked up to me and said give me the keys. I will drive and we will get there safe, I know he needs you and I will take you there safe. As I looked at him he had tears in his eyes too.I handed him the keys and we climbed in the truck and he handed his keys to someone and said follow us.

What was a 2 hour drive we made in about 45 minutes. When we got there it was about 5 minute ahead of my wife and my son. When they got there I went to the car and got him out of the car seat, and held him and hugged him. As I carried him in the house the tears were still falling. when we got in the house and sat down I looked up and asked' What happened? She looked at me and said he was reaching for a ball and fell in and nobody seen him fall. then she heard my sister-in- law scream out his name. He was floating face down. My oldest brother "Mike" dove in fully clothed and got him and handed him to another nephew. Then Mike started CPR to try and revive him. Finally after about 4-5 minutes he came back to us. Brody was dead because he had lost control of his bodily functions.

Mike took a CPR class about 16 years prior to this and never had to use it ,until then. That was 8 years ago and he is doing good. It changed my life that day and I realized how fragile life is. If you get the chance to learn something that you think you would never use, go ahead and learn it because you never know when you might change someones life with it. I want to thank everybody that was there that day. If you wasn't there, then only God knows what would have happened.

I am writing this with tears in my eyes, tears of joy because I have my son still today,tears of sadness, because I almost lost my son, and year of thankfulness because of family and friends. Without them life would be different.

SO I THANK YOU !!!

I normally don't use names but this I had too ...

tty later
Cowboy