Grace Catherine Fowles

A day with Grace started relatively early. We can now admit that she slept with us regularly in our bed, despite medical warnings to the contrary, as she loved it so much. Typically, she would wake up shortly after Dani and I and we would look at her give us a little smile as we helped get her ready for her day, a large part of which involved picking out her clothes (voted best dressed many times at her preschool). Sometimes, she would go downstairs to our basement and listen to Peloton bike tunes while enjoying a star show projected on the ceiling. After that, she would then eat breakfast, typically enjoying a nice yogurt (or as she called it "yoggies.").

During the pandemic, Grace was a wonderful colleague to me and Dani. She would stay very quiet while we worked, focusing on playing with her various toys provided by her wonderful therapists. However, when there was any telephone call on speaker phone, Grace was quick to chime in with her thoughts, yelling out things and smiling. We very much enjoyed the extra time the stay-at-home atmosphere provided us and Grace would like to thank our employers for providing that.

When pandemic restrictions loosened for us after the vaccine, we would take Grace to the wonderful VIPs Preschool and the other kids in her class would regularly cheer, in unison, "GRACE IS HERE!" We would roll her in, and off she would go, enjoying a day of making art and friends. In fact, she was so good at making friends that last year she was awarded the "Best Friend Award" for her class! We could not have been more proud as parents.

After school, Grace would then be picked up by her mom or her grandmother (known to her as "Gert") and ride in style back home, typically sporting her signature sunglasses. At home she has recently taken a liking to kisses from her dog Bella, going to the playground to swing, watching SpongeBob on her iPad, getting her feet and hands nibbled on by her nine month old brother, and smiling at everyone who needed a smile. In the afternoons, Grace would typically watch her shows, take a walk around our block (she always enjoyed a nice breeze in her face), or go swimming at the local neighborhood swimming pool, the Home of the Innocents, or even our bathtub. Grace very much loved to swim. In some of the best of times, she would blast Jojo Siwa on our bathroom Alexa speaker and smile and kick around the bathtub, screaming in delight the entire way. She regularly tired herself out swimming, and would require a healthy dinner.

After an evening dinner of various mixtures, provided every night by her mother, which almost always included her favorite food, avocados, Grace would settle down for some television entertainment with us. Grace enjoyed watching trash tv - Below Deck, Southern Charmed, and The Circle were some of her favorites and she does not care what you think of her taste in television.

After that, Grace would settle in again between her mom and dad and doze off, ready to brighten our lives the next day. Our days will always be less bright, but unfortunately that is how these things sometimes go.

Grace taught us many things, but for us chief amongst them was empathy. Before living with her, we could never understand what it felt like to be in this position. Now, we have joined a small fraternity of people with similar experiences. While we would not wish this experience on anyone else, we are very grateful for the skill she has taught us, one that only a few people really get to unexpectedly learn before the end comes for them.

As strange as it sounds, while losing her and going through painful experiences by her side will always be the thing we hate the most, we have come to accept and be grateful for even the bad part. Life involves experiencing pain and heartbreak. This is an inescapable rule. Life is not just the good things. And Dani and I are happy that we are alive. But to enjoy being alive means we have to accept all of it - the good and the bad. And Grace introduced us to the purest form of love and now the worst pain of her loss. Because of that, we can now say that we truly experienced life and LIVED. And what a gift that is, to really experience all of it. That is something very few people can say before they themselves die.

Thank you for giving us a full life, Grace. We will always miss you.

Note: Please consider a donation to the Grace Fowles Shine Bright Fund (under Community Foundation of Louisville) which will honor Grace's legacy and support the various charitable organizations that brightened her life: bit.ly/gracefowles