With grace and hope

When I called Dwain Waller last week, he had just arrived to the hospital. Doctors had agreed to induce his wife into labor. His voice was so happy and excited. As president of the Liquid Highway chain, he was a key source for a story I was working on. That he was kind enough to call me on his cell phone from the hospital was touching.
I heard two days later the baby wasn’t doing well. One of Dwain’s clients, a teacher at Travelers Rest, told me the baby was born with a mass in her abdomen and was in intensive care.
Dwain posted every little hope, every challenge and improvement his little girl – Ryker Elise Waller – would go through on his company’s Facebook account over the next few days. For those who don’t know, Liquid Highway is a family-run business designed to benefit charity. So the Facebook account has a happy, conversational, open feel to it. It would be natural for him to post good news there.
So on Jan. 8, he asked his friends to pray.
Time seemed to expand from there. He posted a photo of Ryker with her eyes open. Several hours later came a photo with Ryker and her mom – the baby covered with tubes – and a caption describing her as feisty.
Her lungs started to fail at 3:43 p.m., but half an hour later, Dwain posted a video of Ryker opening her eyes. Just before midnight, he posted another photo with the exciting news that her kidneys were starting to work.
He keeps asking friends to pray the next day as Ryker’s acid and potassium levels fall off, threatening normal kidney function. He worried she would not make it through the night.
By 1 a.m. Sunday, her mom, Keeli, said she believed her daughter – stubborn like her dad and feisty like her mom – would recover from this and share her amazing story. But her veins were used up and doctors needed to give her more medicine.
A photo later that morning showed Ryker with booties on. “Keeli just had to make her a fashion diva with her first pair of shoes ,” Dwain wrote.
“She is so pretty,” he wrote again Sunday afternoon – a photo showed the girl sleeping peacefully. “Holding my Baby’s hand,” he wrote with another photo.
By 10 a.m. Monday, Jan. 11, she was gone.
“I dont even know where to begin. First, our daughter Ryker is in heaven smiling down at Keeli and I. She is also smiling down at all of you who have been touched by her. Saying thank you to our family, friends and even total strangers who have offered support does not come close to doing it justice. From the bottom of our hearts I give you all ultimate thanks for your prayers and support. Our daughter who lived 5 days touched more people in her brief life than I have touched my 32 years. She caused people to come together, to pray, and to grow closer to not only one another but to Christ. Keeli and I are not sad. We are excited and happy!! Ryker changed Keeli and I beyond measure. She became a Mommy and I became a Daddy and that will never change. Our daughter will always be with us.”
I don’t know Dwain well. He is a nice man who returned my call hours before his first daughter was born. Life is a series of small decisions that amount to a personal ethic and, ultimately, a legacy. His small kindness to me a week ago now brings tears to my eyes.
Nobody deserves the pain he and his wife are feeling right now. They are handling it with grace and – I hope – are comforted by the support coming to him from the hundreds of people who have benefited from his kindnesses, large and small.