In the dark evening hours of Saturday night, SS. John and Paul assistant football coach John Buskirk lost a nearly four-year battle with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia.

Buskirk leaves behind an adoring wife, Jessica, a family that loved him, two schools, SJP and Harvey, full of students and athletes who admired and respected him as both a teacher and a coach, and several counties of people who were touched by his courageous battle with a devastating disease.

As is the case when good people are lost too early in their lives, I could go on and on about the unfairness and senselessness of John’s fate. I could talk of how much it hurts everyone that knew of the Buskirks plight to learn of the tragic end their story has reached. Certainly, that is what we have all been thinking and feeling in the last day or so.

I am no different. I spent all of Saturday night and much of Sunday pondering those dark thoughts. But as the grief started to overwhelm me and I looked back on all the times I talked with John and Jessica about their lives, something jarred me. I was looking at the whole situation wrong.

Not that the grieving was wrong, because any time a person passes on, it is a sad event, no matter the circumstances. But it occurred to me that the way I was going about it was all wrong. It is wrong to think of John and Jessica and to pity them. It is wrong to bemoan the unfairness.

It is unfair and, truth be told, people the likes of John, a 1993 St. John graduate, and Jessica, a 1997 St. John grad, deserved nothing but happiness and smiles in life. They, more than most people I’ve known, deserved the happy ending we search for in our own lives.

But something John told me way back in January of 2006 when he first learned of his diagnosis and elected to speak with me about it struck me.

I had asked John and if he was wondering, “Why me?” His answer surprised me.

“You’ve got to ask that question,” Buskirk had said. “I think somebody bought Jessica the book, ‘When Bad Things Happen To Good People.’

“I’d like to think I was doing a lot of things right and not that many wrong. But, you know, something bad is going to happen in your life. Some rain is going to fall on you. This just happens to be our particular cross and our particular challenge at this time. We’re just trying to approach it and take of of business.”

I learned a lot about John and Jess in that brief statement. It was as if he was saying, “Sure, it’s rotten luck, but there’s a reason for this. But instead of feeling sorry for myself, I’m going to look this problem in the eye and fight.”

And fight, the Buskirks did. For nearly four years, most of their married life, John and Jess fought. They spent four Christmases in a row at the Cleveland Clinic. John, Jess and their doctors battled the leukemia into remission twice.

And so I got to thinking. If John could face death with courage and never pity himself or talk of the unfairness of his plight, why should I dishonor his memory with doing exactly what he refused to do?

The only correct answer is I shouldn’t.

And so I won’t. I’ll honor John and Jessica and their family and friends by attacking life as John would have.

There was a reason John and Jessica’s story touched so many. It wasn’t because their situation was entirely unique. Thousands of people face the same circumstances each day.

It was the way John and Jessica fought. They were open and honest. They faced the leukemia head on. They hurt, as any of us would. But they were strong in the face of what we all fear. They stood tall.

That kind of courage touches people. It changes people.

In that, there is no surprise, then, that the Buskirks had communities of people rally to their sides. In that, there is no surprise that 1982 St. John alumnus Urban Meyer took a liking to the Buskirks and befriended them. In that, there is no surprise Heisman Trophy winner and two-time national champion quarterback Tim Tebow would contact the Buskirks with a kind word in the toughest of all times, all the while preparing for one of the biggest games of his young life.

So when life is difficult and I’m facing tough times, I’ll not wonder why me. John and Jessica Buskirk taught me a lot about life and love in the short time I’ve known them. I’ll think of them and the cards they were dealt. I’ll remember John as the most courageous man I’ve met and I’ll fight on because of him.

That’s the only way I know to honor a man that touched myself as he had so many others.

And if I knew John even a little, he would ask for nothing more.



Ettinger is a sports writer for the Star Beacon. Reach him at bettinger@starbeacon.com.