RUNNEMEDE Ryan Lewis was the kind of kid that put others before himself, so many others that for Wednesday night\’s closed-casket viewing, his family had to extend the hours.
\”This is very overwhelming,\” said aunt Cheryl Ashton as she sat outside the Gardner Funeral Home.
Inside, friends and family stood in a line that spanned the length of the funeral home. They shuffled past photo collages of Ryan growing up, exchanging murmured comments and tearful hugs with other mourners.
Others walked out of the funeral home wiping tears from their eyes, still visibly shaken by what can only be described as a tragic loss of life.
\”He was the kind of kid who would give you his last dollar,\” said aunt Susan Stacy. \”He would never leave the house without giving me a hug.\”
It was only one week ago when Ryan came home sick after working a shift at one of his two summertime jobs. Although he had a sinus infection, Ryan didn\’t think twice before jumping out of bed to help three friends stranded on a sandbar in the middle of the Delaware River.
It was this act of kindness, the last in a long line of good deeds, that cost him his life. It would be more than 72 hours until his body was recovered.
\”We went crazy the first couple of days,\” said Ashton. \”We could believe he went out there and did that, we (just) couldn\’t believe what happened.\”
Ashton joined a growing throng of grief-stricken family members waiting along the Delaware River\’s banks on August 30 as rescue crews completed the first 24 hours of their search.
Two days later she would be the one who found Ryan\’s body after a long night of searching the river by spotlight.
We stayed out until 1:30 in the morning in the river,\” she said. \”We lined up four boats with spotlights (until) the spotlights started playing tricks on us and I thought I was going crazy.\”
The search party then pulled into a cove along the river, threw an anchor overboard and slept on the boat. The next morning Ashton spotted Ryan less than 500 yards from where she had spent the night.
\”It was almost like he was waiting for me to come and get him,\” she said. \”I never really believed in faith, I have never been a strong believer, but I am today.\”
The discovery of Ryan\’s body gave his family a sense of closure, but it was a week\’s worth of mourning as the family poured over old photographs and videos that helped most.
\”It was like waking from a nightmare,\” Ashton said of the days following Ryan\’s death.
Wednesday night seven collages made from photographs of Ryan at all ages giving hugs, hanging out with friends, graduating from high school were the focal point of the closed-casket viewing.
Ryan was starting a new chapter in his life, crossing that often turbulent channel from adolescence to adulthood. He was three days into a job that he loved, ripping tickets at the Lincoln Financial Field during Eagles games and worked off days at a local Walgreens Pharmacy.
The West Deptford High School grad was preparing to attend Gloucester County College in the fall.
\”He was looking for that one true love to settle down and start a family,\” said Stacy. \”He said he wanted to make his parents proud, but of course they already where.\”
Source http://www.nj.com
