Be a good person and help others, Jim Bachelis asked of his children in 1998 as he sat alone on a park bench making a videotape for them to watch after he was gone.
Be happy and like yourself. Make me proud. And, always remember this, daddy loves you very much.
Brett was 5 at the time, now he’s 30. Lauren was 9, and now she’s just had her first child at 34 — a girl she named Jordyn after her father, Jim, who died of cancer at age 41.
“My brother and I still play that videotape at least once or twice a year, usually on Father’s Day, his birthday, or the day he died,” Lauren said. “We’ve digitalized it. It’s my most prized possession, next to my baby girl.”
Jim still looked healthy and strong in that video. Cancer hadn’t robbed him of that, yet. This was the father he wanted his kids to remember.
I know every father who read my column about Jim Bachelis on February 19, 1999 was thinking the same thing that I was thinking while I was writing the column.
We were all putting ourselves on that park bench alone, knowing we were going to die, and giving the young children we’d never see grow up the best advice a father could offer.
Jim Bachelis wasn’t thinking about his life. He was thinking about theirs.
“It was the best gift he could have ever given our children,” said Wendy Bachelis. “I’ve seen the impacts it’s had on their lives.”
After Jim passed, they joined Our House, a Woodland Hills and West Los Angeles grief support center helping families deal with the overwhelming feelings of loss and depression after a loved one dies.
You can’t do it alone. Our House got them through the worst time of their lives and now, 25 years later, they’re still paying it back for other children and wives who need a wide shoulder to lean on.
On Sunday, April 14, a “Walk and Remember 5K” will be held at Woodley Park. An estimated 1,500 people will come together in memory of loved ones to walk around stroller and wheelchair-friendly…
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