Joel Valdez entered North High School in the fall of 2005. He followed his brother, Keith, who was a star athlete, popular and respected. It would have been understandable if Joel had resented the inevitable shadow his brother cast. But the opposite was true.
Keith is my idol, Joel would say, and he too became an athlete, partaking in football, wrestling, cross country. The two brothers were leaders in the Fellowship of Christian Athletes. Joel joined ROTC. He grew into a star in his own right.
A few weeks ago, he wrote Keith a letter: Everything I did, I did because I wanted to be like you. Your brotherhood means the world to me. I love you with all my heart.
The letter made Keith cry. Joel was never shy about expressing affection, but his sincerity still made Keith marvel. Exuberant, that’s the word. Joyously unrestrained. The kid with the million-dollar smile, one of Joel’s teachers always said. He was the teenage boy who held his mom’s hand in public, and if someone teased him, he would say, “What about it, bro?” and flash that grin of his.
Joel joined the Marine Corps Reserve in his senior year. He completed his high school coursework early, went to boot camp, finished with a physical-fitness score of 288, near perfect. He was back in time to join his fellow classmates for graduation, donning a cap and gown over his dress blues.
On Jan. 3, Joel was on the road to Texas. His dad had asked him for help moving from Denver. They were caravaning; Dad in the lead. They’d driven all night. At 5:41 a.m., Joel posted a message on his My- Space page. Part of it read: “Life is absolutely spectacular.”
A little more than an hour later, on a two-lane road in southeastern New Mexico, Joel ran head-on into a semi-truck. State troopers said he must have fallen asleep. They found no skid marks. No drugs. No alcohol.
Joel was killed instantly. He was 18.
Joel’s funeral was last Friday. At least 600 people attended. After the burial, a memorial potluck dinner was held in his honor in the North High cafeteria.
Had the loss to this community not been made plain earlier in the day, it becomes so then. The cafeteria fills with a few hundred people, former classmates, his many friends, his family, former principals, assistant principals, teachers, mentors.
“He was a child who could capture one’s heart in a very short time,” says JoAnn Trujillo Hays, who came to know Joel well when she was North principal. “He was such a together kid. He had this combination of charm and innocence, and he had a strong sense of humanity and service and of his place in the world. I always thought one day we would be reading about his accomplishments.”
I am sitting with Hays and Cindy Daisley, whose twin sons graduated with Joel. Cindy tells me, “I cannot say enough about Joel. He was one of the bright stars of North.” And to my right, school nurse Myriam DeLeon says, “He’d see me in the clinic, and he’d run in to give me a hug. Joel was a son of this school. He and Keith were the sons we wanted and had.”
Joel’s mother, Joyce, enters the cafeteria walking alongside Keith, now an Air Force military police officer. She raised both brothers and their two sisters, Sherice and Nicole, as a single mother.
“He’s home now in heaven,” Joyce says. “That’s my only comfort.” She begins to weep. “I had him on Mother’s Day. May 12, 1991. He was truly a gift.”
Keith had a dream about Joel after the accident. It was winter, and snow covered the hill in the backyard of their childhood home. He was sledding, barreling fast downhill, and he felt arms around him, and he turned to see Joel laughing. The dream made Keith happy and sad, and he says: “I know this sounds strange, but I really do believe my brother was an angel.”
Four hours after the memorial began in the cafeteria, Joel’s classmates gather outside with candles. By this time, most of the adults have left. Joel’s family remains, and so do a couple of coaches, including football coach Paul Kelly, who says Joel was like a son to him. He tells me how once he went to the school cafeteria for lunch and found Joel leading a table in prayer. Joel was never shy about his faith, and this love, too, filled him with light.
There is an abandonment with which young people grieve when adults are not around, a giving way which lays them bare. We forget the hearts of our youth are full of power, and that power is only strengthened by their fragility and resiliency.
A young man named Thien Tai stands in the circle of candlelight against the night lights of the city, and he sobs for Joel, for what was and what will no longer be, and the circle closes tighter, the embrace of a family in the memory of a brother who loved them and whom they loved in return.
Tina Griego writes Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. Reach her at 303-954-2699 or tgriego@denverpost.com.
