Jordan Z

When I was in 6th grade, three years ago, there was a girl in my class named Jessie. Her older brother Jordan was a junior. He had had health problems all his life. There was something wrong with his lungs, and as a result, his heart had to work harder, over stressing it. That year in 6th grade, Jordan got a heart and lung transplant. My small class of 12 prayed for him just about every school day. His transplant went great and the organs weren’t really rejected. I hadn’t really thought about Jordan lately, and I haven’t talked to Jessie in a while, so I had no idea how Jordan was doing. Recently, though, I found out his body is rejecting the organs, 3 years after the surgery. The doctors told him that only a miracle can save him, and he has anywhere from 2 months to 2 years. As I said, my class prayed for Jordan almost every school day of 6th grade. When I found out that Jordan’s heart and lungs were being rejected, I asked God, "Why?" Well, I didn’t just ask, I shouted at Him. I couldn’t understand why this was happening. Hadn’t our prayers worked? And my class wasn’t the only people praying for Jordan. Did our prayers have no effect? Then I realized 3 years. Jordan had 3 years of being healthy. Before his surgery, he couldn’t even walk upstairs at school without turning blue. Afterwards, he could run and jump and just be normal. And he graduated from high school. They didn’t even expect him to live to be old enough to graduate when he was younger, let alone be healthy enough to do schoolwork. I remember being at his graduation. It was my school’s first. His mom said something along the lines of "Jordan can be proud to say he graduated fifth in his class." I should mention that there were only five people in the graduating class of 2001.


I wrote that on February 6, 2003, when I was in 9th grade. That was about one and a half years ago. When I look back on it now, it seems unfinished. When I wrote it, I expected to hear any day that Jordan had died. But he didn’t. Instead I heard he got better. He didn’t regain perfect health, but better than he was. And then I didn’t hear much. Every so often, I would hear someone say, "Oh Jordan’s not doing very well." But, like I said, I didn’t hear very much. Then today I saw on my mom’s e-mail that Jordan’s funeral is Wednesday, October 13, 2004. Jordan died on Sunday, October 10, 2004. It was expected, yet unexpected. I’ve known that Jordan would die someday. I just wasn’t expecting it now. I wasn’t expecting it today.

It wasn’t fair that Jordan was so sick that he needed a transplant. It wasn’t fair that the transplant didn’t work as well as it was supposed to. It isn’t fair that he died. But life is not fair. However...God is fair. He knows why He did what He did.

My life will go on. Jordan was not my best friend. Jordan was not my brother. I don’t think I’ve even seen Jordan since his graduation in 2001. Jordan’s death will not affect me if I don’t want it to. But I want it to. I want to live my life for God, not for myself. I want to remember that this day could be my last, that there might not be a tomorrow. I want to remember that our God is an awesome God. I want to remember that He knows all the plans He has for me, plans to prosper me and not to harm me, plans for a hope and a future. I want to remember that He will be with me always, even to the end of the age.

Jordan Z’s obituary is in the paper. Here are excerpts from it:
"Jordan Z, 21 passed from this life into the waiting arms of his Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ on Sunday, October 10, 2004.
He graduated from (my school) in May, 2001 and attended (a local community college). Jordan was diagnosed with pulmonary hypertension at age 3 and underwent a heart-double lung transplant in January, 2000 at St. Louis Children’s Hospital. He enjoyed history, mythology, collecting comic books, animals, weaponry, music, playing his guitar and making people laugh.
His life, story and testimony touched countless lives. Anyone who knew him was inspired by his courage, faith and quiet acceptance with which he dealt with his condition. He was greatly loved by all who knew him and will be deeply missed."

I didn’t know Jordan very well at all. I prayed for him. I saw him at school a few times. That’s it. I don’t even remember ever speaking to him. But as must be obvious by now, he touched my life. I’m sad that Jordan died. But I don’t think Jordan is sad. I think he is much happier right now than he has ever been in his entire life. He’s in "the waiting arms of his Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ." And that’s the best place to be. And now, I think, it’s finally finished.

Me
October 12, 2004

PS Today I had to take the PSAT at the school where Jordan's sister Jessie now attends. I didn't get a chance to talk with her, (I haven't seen or talked to Jessie since 6th or 7th grade) but one of my friends did. And you know what she said? My friend told me that Jessie is so happy for her brother, because he's not in pain any more and he is with Jesus. Wow.

Speech!

The following is a speech I wrote for school. The topic was: "Wait till you hear what happened to me?" I decided to write about my family. That family wanted me to post this, so here it is.
Keep in mind that there a couple of inside jokes between me and my friends and my teacher (there are only 8 other people in my class at school---all my friends). Also, the countdown time for Lakeside is for when I gave this speech, about two or three weeks ago. Yeah, I know, it's the DeLong thing. Must correct everything. Can't help it. One other bragging note...I got a 100% on this speech. :)

The DeLongs

Everyone thinks that their relatives do strange and embarrassing things. Well, my family...we’re...different. Even more different than normal. I’m not talking about my family as in my parents and my sister. I’m talking about all of them: my grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. The entire DeLong clan, my mom’s side of the family. We see each other every summer at Lakeside, Ohio, where we rent a house and live all together. All 18 of us. Give or take a few. And let me make this point right now...I love them all, even though they drive me crazy.

First, there’s the name thing. My mom has a brother and a sister, Michael and Amy. My mom married a Michael and my aunt married a Michael. So, I, along with my sister and all of my cousins, have a dad named Michael and two uncles named Michael. And my Aunt Amy named her daughter Lisa after my mom. And just because we weren’t confused enough, one of my cousins is dating a girl named Sarah. Another is dating a girl named Emily. You’d think out of all the girls in the world, they could find some with names that weren’t already in the family.

Then, there’s the bizarre obsession with grammar, words, spelling, and countdowns. Ever wondered where I got that from? Yes, it’s genetic...it’s the DeLong in me! Every year, my grandfather Papa gets a word of the day calendar. Many of our conversations have included discussions of the spellings and definitions of odd words. For Christmas a few years ago, my Uncle Mike (who’s different from Uncle Michael, who’s married to Aunt Amy) was overjoyed to receive a dictionary of uncommon words. After all, he said, who needs to know the definition of hat or chair? And countdowns? Every year, we countdown how many days until Lakeside...days, hours, minutes, and seconds. Right now, there’s about 287 days and 12 hours, 30 minutes, 30 seconds, 29, 28, 27...until Lakeside.

Another odd thing that occurs, is every night at Lakeside, some of the adults have......the Crossword Competition. They get a copy of the crossword from USA Today, sit down in various parts of the house, wait for Uncle Mike to say go, and race to see who finishes first. The only people who really play anymore besides my Uncle Mike, is Uncle Michael and Papa. Uncle Mike is very competitive and almost always wins....that’s probably why there are only 3 contestants now.

There’s also the love of random facts. Every year, if my Uncle Mike doesn’t get an almanac for Christmas, he goes and buys one himself. While we didn’t play random trivia this summer, last year we had nightly rounds, with such important questions as, What is the population of Iceland? or Which movie won the Academy Award in 1988? By the way, the population is 293,966 and Rainman won the Academy Award in 88. We were a little concerned last Christmas at the news that police should be on the look out for almanac-bearers, because quote, the popular reference books covering everything from abbreviations to weather trends could be used for terrorist planning, end quote. Maybe that’s why there weren’t any rousing games of random trivia this year.

I really realized how different my family was last summer at Lakeside. Every morning, the adults, my sister, and I gather on the porch to read the papers. Yes, papers. We typically get 2 or 3 every morning. The second morning at Lakeside last summer, I walked into the porch to hear Papa asking questions and guessing names of famous people. I asked, "What’s going on? What are we doing?" My Uncle Michael said, "It’s Guess Who’s Dead?" I just didn’t really know what to say. Papa eventually correctly guessed the first contestant on Guess Who’s Dead: Katharine Hepburn. That morning, as each family member came to the porch, we played Guess Who’s Dead? That week, we had 3 contestants on Guess Who’s Dead: Katharine Hepburn, Buddy Ebsen (from the Beverly Hillbillies), and Buddy Hackett. Other contestants have included Bob Hope and Bill Bright. Those 2 episodes of Guess Who’s Dead were played on our family website. This summer when I went on my mission trip to Mexico, we left on June 5. As we neared San Antonio where we stopped for the night, we found out on the radio that Ronald Reagan had died. My Uncle Michael and Aunt Amy came to see us because we were staying at their church. What were the first words out of my aunt’s mouth? Not hello, not how was your trip, but, Guess Who’s Dead? This summer, we were ready for a brand new season of Guess Who’s Dead? Our vacation the summer before, the premiere of Guess Who’s Dead, had been a magnet for celebrity deaths. However, this summer, our only contestant, Marlon Brando, made his appearance before we got to Lakeside. Guess Who’s Dead even has a slogan (that I came up with): Guess Who’s Dead...Everyone’s dying to get on!

Yes, we DeLongs do really strange things. I’ve tried in the past to prove that I was adopted...however, I look and act like too many members of my family for that to be true. Some of my cousins are embarrassed by some of the things we do. I got over THAT one a long time ago. Besides, if my family didn’t do the things that we do, my life would not be nearly as interesting.

The End