In Memorium
McKenzie Haggerty-Harrison
September 23, 1987 - September 7, 2004
Oh McKenzie!
Our beloved best friend, daughter, sister, granddaughter, lover.
As an ethically intelligent motivated kick ass feminist eco-terrorist she had already led a life beyond that of many souls. She had spent a summer in France, extensively traveled the west coast, had just completed four months in Central America on her own, sailed the Caribbean, the Panama Canal, as well as the eastern Central Pacific. Toward the end of this tour McKenzie lived with a Mayan shaman and worked with a Mayan midwife and was joined by her mother for the last two weeks in Guatemala. She was a dancer, a fighter, a lover, and a dreamer, and had a way for spreading joy and good vibes to all who she came in contact with. She had an exceptional sense of humor, and a piercing ability to make decisions based on love and wisdom. McKenzie was an accomplished jeweler, fire spinner, Spanish speaker, fashionista, vegan cook, activist, writer, drama queen, clown, teacher, and student. McKenzie was on her way to Portland, Oregon to visit her brother when her car, driven by another, went off the road outside Fallon, Nevada early Saturday morning. She will always be remembered as a budding gypsy pirate on her final voyage. Her attitude, grace, beauty, and intelligence will always live on in the people whose lives she illuminated. Her spirit still lives on in the hearts of her mother, Shannon; her father, Wesley; her brothers, Trevor and Gentry; grandparents, Mike and Mimi, aunts, uncles, cousins, her true love, Jeff Baer-"Haystack", pets, and uncountable friends and kindred spirits throughout the world. McKenzie has truly taught us to live her legacy through one of her most favorite quotes, "Dream as if you'll live forever, live as if you'll die today" - James Dean.
Harmony...I'll miss you so much. Our nickname for you proved so true to your kindred spirit as what you seemed to bring everyone was harmony. You were the light of my life from third grade. Even though you were so small then, your presence was so large. Even when I was going through such terrible times at my young age, I would look at you and realize that there was amazing good in the world. You made everything okay. I would say, "it's alright, because you're in this world, and there has to be others like you that I will grow up around, it will all be okay." I will never fully comprehend the tremendous loss the world suffered on the day you died, only sixteen days before your 17th birthday. Already you had done so much good in this world, more than most anyone can say they'll achieve in their entire life, all by the age of 16. You were too young to die, you were too beautiful to leave us, my heart aches so badly knowing that you are not here on this earth. I wish I could have changed places, if I had had the chance how I would have died without a second thought so that you could live! You've touched so many lives and so many hearts just with your smile alone. You were this adorably sweet embodiment of everything good in a person, of something most of us only go so far as to dream of becoming, you were my role model, even though I was two years older than you. This whole thing has made me speechless, what am I to do without you alive? I wish you were here, I wish I could hug you once more, to hear you laugh, to see another gorgeous bracelet you had made...you were always so good at those. I want to go to your house again, to play with your pet bunnies, to have you point out so many more beautiful things about the world and life that I have never even noticed. I want you to be back again, I want you here. I know your body has died, and that your spirit has continued on to much greater things, but I want to be selfish...I don't want you to leave yet...but you have, and it's one of the greatest pains that I've experienced. I will never ever forget you, Harmony. When I look at nature, or listen to the trees talk with the wind, I have always thought of you, you are like mother nature herself, and I will still continue to think of you... As hard as it is, I will keep living, I know you want everyone to do just that. I want to know that I will somehow keep helping the world as you did, but I'm afraid I'll never be able to as much as you did, no one could ever replace your presence, ever.