Lucian

 I was finishing a long and admittedly boring training yesterday with two other teachers when I heard one of them let out a horrific gasp.  I looked up in concern as she read aloud the email we had each just received.

It was devastating news.  I've cried so many tears.  

One of our precious kindergarten students had passed away.  He drowned in the pond at a local park.

My heart felt like it was ripped in half.  I hurt for his teachers.  I hurt for his parents and family.  I was in disbelief.

Lucian was in our special needs classroom.  A classroom where I teach Spanish once a week.  He had shoulder length beautiful hair, an impish smile and was lightning quick.  He was a handful and a heartful.  

At the beginning of the year when I would come he would yell and run away.  After a few weeks he would watch my computer as I led them in our Spanish songs they had grown to love.  Before long he would wave in the hall and sometimes take my hand to help him walk to class. Then about a month ago he transitioned to the floor by me and finally on my lap.  Last Friday, my last interaction with him, he sat securely on my lap leaning back.  When I reached over to the next student near us, he held my hands and wrapped them around him.  He wasn't sharing that hug that day.

Now I see him wrapped in the perfect love of the Savior's arms.  I pray his Momma and family can also feel those arms.  

I take comfort in these words by Thomas S Monson:

"There is only one source of true peace. I am certain that the Lord, who notes the fall of a sparrow, looks with compassion upon those who have been called upon to part—even temporarily—from their precious children. The gifts of healing and of peace are desperately needed, and Jesus, through His Atonement, has provided them for one and all.

The Prophet Joseph Smith spoke inspired words of revelation and comfort:

“All children who die before they arrive at the years of accountability are saved in the celestial kingdom of heaven.” D&C 137:10

“The mother [and father] who laid down [their] little child[ren], being deprived of the privilege, the joy, and the satisfaction of bringing [them] up to manhood or womanhood in this world, would, after the resurrection, have all the joy, satisfaction and pleasure, and even more than it would have been possible to have had in mortality, in seeing [their] child[ren] grow to the full measure of the stature of [their] spirit[s].”This is as the balm of Gilead to those who grieve, to those who have loved and lost precious children."

This isn't a great picture of me.  But Lucian wanted me to take our picture.  I'm so glad I said yes. Take the pictures.  Hug your kids.  Share love and grace with all.  And please pray for his family at this difficult time.