A DEATH

               When I go out west to the Arizona and California deserts to those places according to NOTHING DOING  where five men are without graves that might be called their own, I read the local weekly and sometimes semi-weekly newspapers.  I try to avoid the newspapers of the empire those that aspire to be and insist on being read by the whole country and the world.  They seem closer to being the records of the court as were the great memoirs of the court of Louis the 14th… and little reflect the lives of those upon which the empire was built.

         I have been reading and re-reading an article from the newspaper of Twentynine Palms.

CRASH VICTIM REMEMBERED FOR BIG PERSONALITY

Twentynine Palms.  Family and friends of Terri Brooks gathered in a candlelight vigil Tuesday January20, [2015] to remember a woman who was called a friend to everyone she met.

(2)  Brooks, 26, of Twentynine Palms died in a traffic accident on the  Utah Trail at Twentynine Palms Highway Wednesday morning, when her car was struck broadside by a pick up truck.

(3) The candlelight vigil was held around a shrine on the spot where her vehicle came to rest after the accident.

(4) “Today is my birthday,” Terri’s mother, Gail Wentzel, said before a celebration of her daughter’s life began.  She said she wanted to spend her birthday with her daughter.

(5)  Terri, she said as born in Palm Springs and was raised in Yucca Valley but spoke with  a Southern  accent because  her husband a Marine is from South Carolina.

(6) “Terri was very bubbly,” Wenzel said.  Terri’s sister Amanda agreed.

(7)  “She had the ultimate bubbly personality,” she said.

(8) Terri’s father, Rod Lewis, opened  the celebration by thanking all those who took part and reading from the Book of Isaiah.

(9) “The Lord is the everlasting God, “ he read.  “He gives strength to the weary.”

(10)  “We don’t understand why Terri had to leave us,” he said.  “she was loaned to us by the Lord.  She will be looking down on us.”

(11)  “Terri didn’t just enter a room, she swept into a room.” He said.  “Terri never met a person who wasn’t her friend.”

(12) Wenzel remembered telling Terri telling a friend, “I love you with all my butt because my butt is bigger than my heart.”

(13) She recounted the morning of her last telephone conversation with her daughter, who was busy with her daughter, who was busy getting her children ready for school, the same morning she heard about the accident.”

(14) “I thought I was having a nightmare,” she said.

(15) The vigil gave her a look at what Terri’s life was all about, Wenzel added, “I see all the love Terri received and all the lives she impacted.”

SURVIVED BY HUSBAND AND THREE CHILDREN

(16) Terri grew up in Yucca Valley and was mom to a daughter Grace and a son, Bentley, when she met  Tylor Brooks, a U.S. Marine from Chesnee, South Carolina.  The two were married Sept. 1, 2012, and had a daughter Emma.

(17) Also part of their lives was a daughter  who was born to Tylor Brooks on Dec. 13, 2009, and died  a month later, on Jan. 10, 2010.  Terri Brooks kept baby Kinsley’s memory alive, Tylor’s sister, Jessica Miller, said Monday.

(18) “Every year on Kinsley’s birthday, she would get a balloon for each year,: Miller said.  “She kept her alive in the house with pictures, Christmas ornaments … she was amazing; she was an amazing person.”

(19) Terri had recently graduated from college with a nursing degree. She loved Marilyn Monroe and the Dallas Cowboys, but most of all, she loved her family, Miller said.

(20) “She loved, loved and worshiped my brother.  She was just a miracle in my bother’s life,” the North Carolina resident said.

(21) Terri’s sister, Mandy Lewis, and their mom still live in Yucca Valley. “Terri was loved by many and she touched so many people’s hearts,” Lewis said.

(22) A little before 8 a.m. Jan. 14, Brooks pulled her Ford Fusion from Utah Trail onto westbound Twentynine Palms Highway. She apparently did not see a Ford F-350 pickup truck coming toward her, according to a Sheriff’s Department news release.

(23) The truck’s driver, 54-year-old Kelly Diaz, of Twentynine Palms, tried to avoid the collision, but hit Brooks’ car on the driver’s side.

(24) Brooks died on the scene.

(25) Her three children were in seatbelts in the backseat. Bentley, 4, and Emma, 1, were not seriously hurt, but 7-year-old Gracie suffered a hairline fracture in a facial bone, Miller said. She will need surgery.

(26) At the urging of his family, Miller said, Tylor created a fundraising page to collect donations for Terri’s final arrangements and the children’s care.

(27) By Wednesday Jan. 21 56 people had donated $3,475.

(28) “My brother doesn’t ask for anything, never has .  My family told him he’s got to do it,” Miller said

(29) He did not tell the story of the accident on the Gofundme page because he didn’t want Terri to be remembered in that way, she added.  “He wants people to remember as joyful.”

(25) The fundraising page is at