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On Friday, February 8th, students at Boon Elementary traded their pencils and paper for a lesson on friendship and love as they celebrated the life of Spencer Patton Squire, along with the 100th day of school. A balloon launch, traditionally held on the 100th day of school, usually fills the sky with the colors of the Boon Patriots, but this year, the faculty and students at Boon opted to release rainbow-colored balloons to commemorate their fellow classmate.
With colored balloons signifying each grade, the energetic students filled the school grounds and anxiously awaited the launch. Matthew Magee, Boon 4th grader and neighbor to the Squire family, recited a poem written by Spencer’s Aunt, Margo Dailey, entitled “Spencer’s Rainbow”. Tammie James, principal at Boon Elementary, presented the Squires with a copy of Where Do Balloons Go? by Jamie Lee Curtis, a book the students donated to the school library. Then, after younger brother Ryan Squire offered a count-down, the teachers, students, and parents cheered as the multi-colored balloons created a rainbow in the cloudless sky.For a boy who was baptized under a rainbow balloon arch, painted a perfect rainbow at age 3, and loved to recite the seven colors of the rainbow, this was a fitting tribute that served as one more source of strength for Spencer’s family. Like the rainbows that glistened on September 8th and October 8th, the first and second months after his death on August 8th, the rainbow that appeared on a sunny day as his friends enjoyed an afternoon at the park, and the rainbow that peeked through clouds on his birthday on December 9th, the “Boon Rainbow” symbolized Spencer’s faith and joyful spirit.
Spencer’s colorful, bright spirit is still evident throughout Boon Elementary in the laughter of the students, in the warm smiles of the teachers, and in the welcoming arms of friends.
Spencer’s friends, fellow classmates and teachers at Boon have all learned so many things these past six months through this one little boy’s legacy. Such lessons shouldn’t have to be “learned” at such a tender age, but the Squire family has graciously included the school in their own healing process and Spencer’s classmates have no doubt benefited because of it. Because Spencer was such an outgoing child, he was known by many. What could have been a situation where children saw a family withdraw from the community because of this tragic loss has turned into a lesson of healing and continued love. Goodness knows the family had every reason to take a step back and seclude themselves except for one major obstacle…Spencer would have never done that. He wasn’t one to retreat. It wasn’t in his character and the Squires are intent on him living on through them, his friends, classmates and the now incalculable amount of lives he continues to touch. Every rainbow is Spencer smiling back down as if to say, “Keep going! Life is a beautiful thing.”
