Buffy Renee Brandon

From Buffy's father Randy...
To all of the amazing, and wonderful friends, and family members out there: I simply could not contact every one of you to express my heartfelt thanks for all that you have done to help me through this extraordinarily difficult time in my life. So, please allow this note to be an enormous thank you letter from the bottom of my heart, not only from me, and Barby, but for my entire family as well.

So many of you have opened your hearts, and your wallets to send along literally hundreds of cards, checks, and nice thoughts of support.. Words alone are really not enough to tell you all how much that every bit of it means to me. But nonetheless, I still just wanted to give a big thank you to everyone out there who cares about Buffy, and just know that your support in this difficult time means everything to me, and my family.

I am enclosing a little something that I wrote for the Celebration of Life recently held in L.A.

*****************************

I wrote this on my way to the Celebration of Life held for the family and friends of my daughter, Buffy Renee’ Brandon on May 10th, 2003 in Canyon Country, California.

When we become parents, it remains a sort of an unwritten code that our main obligation to our children is to protect them from harm, and to teach them all that we can from our own experiences, so that they will have the knowledge needed to live a happy and fulfilling life of their own.

But after much soul searching, and still deeply immersed in my own private world of grief, I had an epiphany of sorts, and decided that in reality the tables had really turned around on me, and that as a father, I had truly been the one who had been the student. And so with those thoughts I wrote the following..

WHAT BUFFY TAUGHT ME

I LEARNED THAT THE GREATEST UNCONDITIONAL LOVE THAT ANYONE CAN EVER
EXPERIENCE IS THE LOVE BETWEEN A PARENT AND A CHILD.

I LEARNED THAT WHAT WAS ULTIMATELY IMPORTANT TO ME WAS THAT BUFFY
BECAME HER OWN PERSON, AND BE HAPPY AND FULFILLED IN WHATEVER SHE CHOSE
TO DO OR TO BE.

I LEARNED THAT I DID NOT EXPECT NOR WANT HER TO BE WHAT I WANTED HER TO
BE. I ULTIMATELY WISHED FOR HER TO BE WHATEVER IT WAS THAT MADE HER
HAPPY, NOT WHAT WOULD MAKE ME HAPPY. MY EVENTUAL HAPPINESS WAS ALWAYS
THE RESULT OF HER PERSONALLY DISCOVERING HER OWN DREAMS, AND HAPPINESS.

I LEARNED THAT YOU DO NOT TEACH A CHILD BY WHAT YOU TELL THEM, BUT
RATHER BY WHO YOU ARE AND WHAT YOU DO.

I LEARNED THAT ULTIMATELY WHAT MY LOVING PARENTS HAD PASSED ALONG TO ME
WOULD ULTIMATELY BE PASSED ALONG AGAIN TO MY CHILD.

I LEARNED THAT TO BE A GOOD FATHER IS TO BOTH LET GO, AND TO DRAW
CLOSER AT THE SAME TIME.

I LEARNED THAT SOMETIMES THE SMALLEST THINGS THAT HAPPEN IN OUR LIVES
ARE THE ONES THAT WE TEND TO REMEMBER THE MOST.

I LEARNED THAT ALL THE WORDS IN ALL THE BOOKS THAT HAVE EVER BEEN
WRITTEN ARE NOT ENOUGH TO EXPLAIN ONE SIMPLE HUG OR A SMILE.

I LEARNED THAT DISTANCE AND EXPERIENCES ARE NOT ENOUGH TO SEPARATE TWO
SOULS WHOSE LIVES WERE ALWAYS ONE EXPERIENCE.

I LEARNED THAT EVEN DEATH IS NOT ENOUGH TO STEAL THE MEMORIES OF HER
LIFE FROM ME.

AND LASTLY, I LEARNED HOW TO REALLY SMILE AT LIFE AND ALL THE JOYS AND
SORROWS THAT IT BRINGS.

I LEARNED ALL OF THESE THINGS AND MUCH, MUCH MORE FROM MY WONDERFUL
BUFFY RENEE. SHE HAD NO IDEA THAT SHE WAS INDEED TEACHING ME THESE
THINGS FOR HER ENTIRE LIFE. FOR ALL OF THESE THINGS, AND MORE, I WILL
ALWAYS BE GRATEFUL.

A WISE OLD ZEN MASTER ONCE SPOKE THIS FAMOUS QUOTE, AND IT SEEMS SO
POIGNANT AT THIS TIME; IT GOES AS FOLLOWS: “WHEN THE STUDENT IS READY,
THE TEACHER WILL COME.”

BUFFY CAME, SHE SMILED, SHE TAUGHT, AND SHE LEFT.

I CAN STILL BARELY ACKNOWLEDGE THE FACT THAT SHE IS GONE, AND I WOULD
HATE TO EVER IMAGINE A WORLD OF MINE IN WHICH SHE HAD NEVER BEEN.

SHE SENT ME THIS QUOTE NUMEROUS TIMES AND I BELIEVE THAT IT WAS ONE,
IF NOT HER “ALL TIME FAVORITE “ QUOTES:
“I WOULD RATHER HAVE A FEAST OF FRIENDS, THAN TO GO TO HEAVEN.”

I CAN’T HELP BUT THINK THAT WHEREVER SHE IS, IN WHATEVER FORM SHE HAS
BECOME, THAT EVEN THERE SHE STILL HAS A “FEAST OF FRIENDS”.

****
Randy Brandon, Buffy’s Father