Whoever said it takes a village to raise a child obviously did not have Ken Downs in their life. While it might be true for most people, I firmly believe that this one man alone has saved countless lives, raised dozens of children and touched the lives of every person he's met.
I came into the story years after it began. Downs, as everyone referred to him as, was at one point in his church service my husbands priest quorum advisor. Now that in and of itself should qualify any man for sainthood. It can't be the easiest job when all the teens are doing their best to follow the gospel standards but imagine it when you have a kid whose greatest pleasure seemed to be seeing how many schools he can get kicked out of in a school year or how many mail boxes could be blown up before anyone caught him. This might have put a mere mortal man off, they may have turned tail and run but not Downs. He had a way with the boys, the good, the bad and the down right ornery just seemed to gravitate toward him. A fireman by day he had all the cool gadgets and new lots of cool tricks and the best part of it for my husband was that he knew how to safely blow things up, catch things on fire and put it out again. Perhaps this was before law suits and permission slips were a must, but he was able to take the boys on trips to Mexico where survival skills and running from the Mexican police were an exercise that ingrained the importance of prayer into the minds of scared young men as they ran for cover and tried their best to stand for truth and righteousness with the military police breathing down their necks. Despite my husbands quest to “find himself” which often meant “running away from himself”, Downs never let go. He was an anchor in an otherwise turbulent see of teenage hood. The connection the two had did not wither after GC was no longer in his charge.
He would check in with him frequently and continually offered words of encouragement and when we moved back to California as a married couple starting our career and family it was to Downs that we ran. He met us at the moving truck ready to unload. He had made one phone call and what seemed like the entire ward was there to help us move and they were there a few months later when our home was ready and we moved in for good. A somewhat shorter man in stature, he was larger than life and within moments of meeting him your soul was over come with warm fuzzies and the feeling of complete and unabashed love. I will never forget the first time he laid eyes on Zach. He walked in the room, took a double take at what appeared to be a miniature version of his once disobedient priest and paused to place his hand upon his head. His eyes got big and he turned to me and with conviction said, “wow, that is one special spirit right there...you can feel the goodness leaking from every pore. He'd remind me of that often through out the years. He reminded me of it again one day when Zach had locked Bailey in a closet on accident and the door would not budge. The poor girl was trapped without a light and even worse...no game boy or toys. Zach immediately grabbed a flashlight and played flashlight games under the door to entertain her while I reached for the phone and just as always, Downs was on my doorstep within minutes. I am sure the man had super powers, I would often clock the drive from his house to mine and there is no human way possible he could have made it there in the time he seemed to when ever I called.
I liked to think we were special, that our family was his favorite, but as I listened to ward members over the years I found that Downs seemed to be everyone's “go to guy”. He served as counselor, mentor, friend, confident, advisor, and companion to any who would let him.
One of the things we were the most sad about when we left California was that we would no longer have Downs up the street. We were thrilled when a few years later we both ended up in St George. What a thrill to have him at our home once again. When Kaitlyn become very ill and fear set in he came. I don't remember calling him, but then, he seemed to come before we knew we needed him a lot anyway so we weren't shocked that he came. He looked at her, looked at me and said, “she'll be OK”. That was all it took for me to believe it. I felt as though he had a direct connection to my Heavenly Father and if he said it then it must be so.
He passed away this week and the LDS members of the Camarillo Stake let out a collective sob when the news was announced. The tears spread through out the country and even the world as his relationships were on each continent. I myself dropped to my knees in prayer to thank my Father in Heaven for sharing with us for what seemed liked too brief of a time. I didn't pray for his soul, I knew where he would be...serving the youth, comforting those who needed it and watching over his friends and family from a place far better suited to his amazing spirit then Earth. Monday after his death there was something that I would have picked up the phone to discuss with him and of course the realization that he wouldn't pick up was daunting. I was comforted by the fact that his legacy lives on in each of us.
