My story about Joe Rikley

By Bryce Schaufelberger

 I met Joe at the corner of 4th and James in Mission about 26 years ago.

Joe was just a teenager then. His friends, Micheal Lord and John Lord, introduced me to Joe.

The funny thing was when John and I went to the Mac’s store we thought we were going to get candy, but it turns out we were getting a pack of smokes cause Joe was  a smoker at the time and needed someone older to get him cigarettes! I was 25 years old when I met Joe.

John Lord and I visited Joe a lot at his house. We played a lot of games, movies, and listened to music.

Joe liked blades of steel hockey game. He also liked the movie called Fast And Furious and  listen to music by Nickelback.

 

Joe loved his coffee at Tim Horton’s. Joe made us his speciality coffee at his house that he shared with us when we visited him.

I remember when we introduced Joe to our self-advocacy group in Mission.

Our group told him about who we are and what we do and from there he decided to stay with us.

In 2007 our self-advocacy group had a fundraiser to acknowledge me on winning a gold medal in Special Olympics for Team Canada in soccer from Shanghai China. Joe was the Fundraising Coordinator for our group at time.

This was when our group convinced Joe to do the DJ for the event and go on to be business adventure called DJ Wheels.

There were a lot of good times together and we took a lot pictures.

We had a lot of good times together at Inclusion BC conferences. I remember when I was with Joe at a conference in Surrey.

We went with Karla and MACL staff and we came up with a stress ball that we wrote a smiley face on.

Joe and I liked it because it was a fun idea to do with friends.

We also went together to the Inclusion B.C. Conference in Nanaimo.

We went to a lot workshops, but what stood out was that Joe brought his DJ equipment. I helped him set up and we had blast.

It was my birthday and Joe ordered me a lemon meringue pie. He was going to throw it in my face, but instead I used my hands eat it.

I remember him laughing at me because I had a white face.

My friend Joe was great person. He had a manner of respect in how he conducted himself to you. He would help you if you wanted help.

He would tell you the facts of what he thought was right. He was truthful, trustworthy and a delight to be with. He cared for his friends, family, colleagues and anyone he had a connection with. He also would help you when you were down and not well.

Joe would help you solve issues that we all share compassion for.  Joe had will power to succeed in living a life of happiness.

Joe would say, “Don’t let disability affect us, stay strong and don’t let others put you down.”

Joe showed us determination. He worked toward his dreams to succeed.

He proved people wrong about disabilities and ignored those that put you down. He would just go for it and he would do it.

Joe was risk taker and was trying to improve himself to go to university and get a job.

He was a fighter and didn’t let his disability affect him to live his life to the fullest.

He had a big smile that we will miss Joe I love you as friend and i will miss you bud to the moon and back you will not be forgotten.

rest in piece Joe Rikley

Joe video presentation at his celebration of life at Mission Heritage Park  August 17th,2017 to see it  Click Here

[soliloquy id="19117"]

Print Friendly, PDF & Email
This entry was posted in Our Stories. Bookmark the permalink. Post a comment or leave a trackback: Trackback URL.

Post a Comment

Your email is never published nor shared. Required fields are marked *

You may use these HTML tags and attributes <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>

*
*

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Click to listen highlighted text!