A remembrance of Tyler

Everyone knew Tyler’s humor — the sarcasm, the wit, the magnetism that drew people to him. He had a way of saying exactly what he thought, no judgment attached. He’d say his piece, you knew where he stood, and then we’d all move on. Humor was how Tyler and Jackson and their whole friend group stayed connected. In a way, it was their love language.

This last year, though, I saw something different in Tyler. As he struggled, he also started reaching out in more vulnerable ways — not just to the guys, but to the wives who have been part of this circle for a long time. The conversations we had this past year were some of the most raw and honest we’d ever shared. Tyler was always intelligent and curious, someone you could dive deep with on almost any topic, but opening up about his own well-being wasn’t something he used to do easily. That made those conversations even more meaningful.

Tyler was a prolific reader. He introduced me to Game of Thrones (I loved the books, even if the show was too intense for me), shared his mom Kathy’s Kindle library with me, and we bonded over favorites like The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and Ender’s Game. I still have the copy of Ender’s Game he gave me on our family bookshelf. Someday our son will read it, and I hope he feels a little connection to Tyler through it.

He loved Dr. Seuss, and every time our kiddo listens to those stories or reads those books, I think of him.

Tyler was also an incredible piano player. One of Jackson’s early memories of living in the frat house was waking up after a night out partying to Tyler playing beautiful music on the piano in the morning. Years later, during my 30th birthday trip on Lake Coeur d’Alene, I found Tyler sitting at a piano again, at One Shot Charlie's. I asked for Für Elise and of course he delivered. That song later ended up on the playlist I listened to constantly during maternity leave after our son was born. Now it will always remind me of Tyler.

Tyler also had all these wonderfully quirky Tyler-isms. When I first met him, he was missing a front tooth thanks to a ridiculous punching game among the guys. He had a temporary insert he called his “flapper” and would pop it in and out for reasons known only to Tyler — maybe shock value, maybe comedy. Either way it was completely on brand.

He loved to joke that he’d seen me topless — just one boob at a time — thanks to various summer outfits over the years. According to Tyler, I had “PATO’d” him… just separately and at different times.

He was also an amazing cook. The boys in the “Darrel mansion” (or derel mansion??) had their system — Tyler handling sauces and the finer points of cooking, Nate on the grill making incredible meats, and Jackson and Nick on prep duty. We still have Kathy’s legendary family cookbook in a three-ring binder filled with recipes and stories. It’s a treasure in our house. I’ll never forget Tyler’s béarnaise sauce at an Easter celebration the boys somehow managed to pull together, complete with slightly questionable Jesus and Mary candles from a local grocery store decorating the table.

Tyler helped us paint when we bought our house more than ten years ago, and he even helped me plan parts of the yard thanks to that college degree of his. He recommended we plant Linden trees because he loved them. Two didn’t make it, but one did — we've always called it our "special tree" and now I can think of it as our “special-Tyler tree.” It struggled for a while but survived and is thriving now. It will always remind me of him.

This group of friends may have started as Jackson’s, but they became my chosen family too. We’ve shared marriages, babies, holidays, birthdays, turning thirty and then forty, Fourth of Julys, Thanksgivings, weddings, and countless ordinary days that became extraordinary because we were together.

So often Randy and Kathy were at the center of it all — welcoming everyone with patience, food, and open arms; no judgment for the crazy shenanigans. Their home became a gathering place for all of us. That love created the chosen family we still lean on today.

My last phone call with Tyler was the Friday before he died. I was frustrated with him at first and asked what it would take for things to change. But like always with Tyler, the conversation softened. I made sure he knew how much we loved him and that there was nothing he could do that would make us stop loving him. We talked about his hopes of ending up closer to our core group, so he could be nearer to all of us.

By the end of the call, he sounded tired but hopeful. I really thought he might be turning a corner. He ended it the way he always did:

“I love you too, lady.”

Tyler loved deeply — his friends, his family, and all the kids who have come into our lives over the years. He had a tradition of welcoming each new baby in the group with a ridiculously gross wet willy as a sort of honorary initiation.

So when I picture Tyler, I see him in a white T-shirt with the smokes rolled in the sleeve like James Dean, his Papa Bill necklace around his neck, and that cheeky smirk on his face.

I recognize that me telling him that I loved him and would love him no matter what was the last thing I got to say to him, and so many of our friends and his family never get that chance. I am forever grateful for that last conversation. I hope Randy and Kathy can come back to these stories and pictures and memories and feel some laughter and peace.

If you were lucky enough to hear Tyler say “I love you,” you knew he meant it.

And if you earned that from him, you became part of this incredible circle of chosen family.