FREELAND — Energy was abundant in Robert Bruce Knight.
Whether he used it to break out a 30-yard touchdown run or break out in song, it didn’t matter to those who knew him. They just liked to watch Knight shine.
They also liked his hugs.
More than 400 friends and family filled the sanctuary at Trinity Lutheran Church on Friday night for one more chance to share those experiences at Knight’s memorial.
The 22-year-old Freeland man died in a car crash Nov. 12 that also killed Marcel “Mick” Poynter, 20, and Charles “Mack” Porter III, 19.
Knight left lasting memories with those who spoke to the crowd. Eight speakers recalled their fondest memories of Knight and lamented his loss.
His mother, Sharon Knight, recalled the affections of her “little buddy.”
“He always gave me the best heartfelt bear hugs,” she said.
She was a teacher at the elementary school in the town Knight grew up in, Canyon Lake, Calif. As a teacher and a mom, she said she always looked for ways to show him something he didn’t know.
“I was always looking for an object lesson, but in the end it was Robert who was my best teacher,” she said. “He taught me to be strong, a better parent, a better teacher and most of all, not to sweat the small stuff.”
Knight’s father, Bruce Knight, said his son triumphed despite adversity. He talked about Knight’s return from an outdoor therapy camp and a boarding school to play football, and how they traveled to Mexico City to play in a semi-pro game representing Team USA.
“What a priceless memory for a dad with his son,” he said.
Then he shared his son’s hugs with the crowd. He asked everyone to stand up and hug the person next to them. He asked again, and added the suggestion that they hug them like it was the last time they would ever see them.
“Rob was a hugger,” his father said. “From the very day he joined us, he hugged. He didn’t just hug us with his arms, he hugged with his whole body.”
Knight was also a musician. He learned to play piano, guitar and drums. His father held aloft his iPod to play a newfound song his son recorded.
The chorus, sung by Knight, went, “Our fingers they touch, and that is enough, that is enough, because I am in love.”
To Cory Soto, one of Knight’s first friends on South Whidbey, he was the Southern California guy who was always running late.
“He was always on Rob time,” Soto said.
“The way he talked and the way he dressed and, ‘Bro…’ I got that more times, it feels like an explanation.”
Knight was a note-taker, Soto added. He’d hear something he liked, or he’d think of some poignant idea and write it down.
Soto found some of his notes and shared them.
“It is clear that if each individual makes an effort, he or she can make a change.”
“Who cares if people like you, if you don’t like yourself.”
“Who cares if anyone likes you, as long as you like yourself.”
“Put your friends first, they’re your family.”
“Don’t beat up your roommates.”
“That’s the thing,” Soto said, “he put his friends first.”
Lisa Zickafoose, a family friend who lived with the Knight family in Canyon Lake, remembered when she was 12 and he was just a baby. She watched him grow to be “witty, yet sarcastic, good-humored, but often somber.”
“Rob was a dreamer,” Zickafoose said as tears welled in her eyes.
“Spirited and athletic, he was always searching for the next adventure, whether it was cleaning the van with a bucket of wet cement, or locking my keys in the car with the engine running, he knew how to bring the excitement of his adventures home to us.”
Knight’s affection, through hugs and laughs, stuck with her.
“He was our little boy, our baby, and his laughter made us a family,” Zickafoose said. “I will forever miss the hugs he freely shared and the kisses I constantly bombarded him with.”
His sister, Jamie Metcalf, remembered him simply as her sibling.
“For the past week, I’ve been trying to find the right words for tonight,” Metcalf said. “But the first thing that comes to mind is that I love my brother and he loved me.”
Metcalf is a mother of two sons, a 22 month old and a 3 year old. She thanked Knight for preparing her to be a mom all those years ago.
“Now that I am a mother, I realized that everything that I learned about being a mother to sons I learned from my relationship from my brother, and that is the greatest gift he could have ever given me,” Metcalf said.
Pastor Jim Lindus spoke of a season of weeping that now stretches beyond South Whidbey. Lindus told the story of Lazarus dying before Jesus could reach him and told the crowd to remember the shortest verse in the Bible.
“Jesus wept,” Lindus said, quoting John 11:35.
He used that story to illustrate the frustrations and confusion of those hurt by Knight’s death.
“I’m quite certain God was crying out, ‘Not now. Not Rob, not Mick, not Mack. I had so much more for them to do,’” Lindus said.
“And though we weep, we do not weep alone,” he added. “We have each other, and we will not weep forever.”
The Knights have created a scholarship fund in their son’s honor. Donations can be made online at www.trinitylutheranfreeland.org or sent to Trinity Lutheran Church, Attn: Robert Knight Scholarship Fund, PO Box 97, Freeland, WA 98249.
