Dad leaves 'Sweet Pea' letters for her future


Drew Squires, 36, leaves behind wife Liz and daughter Abby after battling ALS.


GREENSBORO — At first glance, it looked like a wedding.

Thirtysomethings, dressed in their best, crowded the sanctuary. They came from as far away as London and Los Angeles to spend a Sunday afternoon inside Grace United Methodist Church.

But then you saw their faces, as stiff as stone, and heard a deafening silence, broken occasionally by a symphony of sniffs. The guests, sitting shoulder-to-shoulder, all came to say goodbye to Drew Squires, a neighbor, colleague and friend.

He died Thursday after a 22-month battle with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis , better known as its dreaded acronym: ALS. He was 36.

You may remember Drew. I wrote about him in this space last fall. He was the father, husband and attorney who became the local face of ALS, a disease that took baseball legend Lou Gehrig.

Last week, the disease took Drew, a Wake Forest grad who loved movies, music, ACC basketball and his wife, Liz, the woman he called his "little red-headed girl.''

During a moving eulogy Sunday, Drew's longtime friend, John Meroney , talked about that love story, sharing an

e-mail Drew sent his wife on the eve of her 32nd birthday. It's an e-mail Meroney still keeps on his computer.

"You get better looking every year and every year I fall deeper and deeper in love with you,'' Drew wrote. "However long the Lord allows me to stay with you, rest assured that I will cherish every single second of it.''

I met Drew and Liz last fall at their home in Greensboro's Kirkwood neighborhood after hearing their neighbors had organized a run in his name to raise money for the ALS Foundation.

His daughter, Abby, then 2, played around his feet. His wife sat beside him. He sat in a mechanized wheelchair and talked about his family, his friends and his will to live.

He told me about his quick deterioration and his appreciation for the little things, like the ringing wind chimes and slight breeze that tickled his cheek. Then, he told me about the letters.

He wrote them to Abby, the little girl he called "Sweet Pea," so she could open them when she turned 3, 4, 5, 15 and 20, as well as when she celebrated her wedding day. He worried he wouldn't be there.

When he mentioned the letters, his voice buckled. But always, he recovered and mentioned the support that enveloped him like a well-worn quilt.

"To receive all this love and support confirms your faith in man,'' Drew told me, wrestling with every word. "There's truth to what you hear, that people are at their best when times are at their worst.''

You heard about that on Sunday. Neighbors and friends spent months coordinating every aspect of the Squires' life. They called themselves The Squires Squad.

Eighty-six members strong, connected through a Web site, they cooked, mowed the lawn, scheduled play dates for Abby, took Liz out to dinner and hung out with Drew to watch ACC basketball.

The tasks helped The Squires Squad deal with their own anguish. They were young, many at the same station in life: caring for young kids, climbing the professional ladder, creating memories.

Just like Liz and Drew.

On Sunday, Liz's college friends came from near and far to support the girl they remembered from Clewell , a dorm at Salem College.

Those friends remembered Drew as the fun-loving man who charmed Liz and loved "those Ziggy's bands.''

They remembered that when they watched the minister push the play button on a boom box perched on the pulpit and heard a Drew favorite, one of "those Ziggy's bands,'' fill the sanctuary.

It was the alt-country band Uncle Tupelo. And it was beautiful. It turned a somber wake into a cathartic celebration, as people walked out of the church and heard a nasal-toned vocalist sing these words:

I'm going where there's no depression
To a better land that's free from care
I'll leave this world of toil and trouble
My home's in heaven
I'm going there.