Early last Saturday morning, our nephew — my wife’s sister’s son, Shayne Rebbetoy — fell to his death. He was just 16.
Flying back to California as soon as possible, landing Sunday afternoon at a very foggy Los Angeles International airport, the news: Kobe Bryant and eight others, including his 13-year-old daughter, Gianna, had been killed just hours earlier in a helicopter crash near Calabasas.
We have spent this week in shock and grief, and in preparing for the seemingly infinite number of details that attend Shayne’s memorial service, which is set for Saturday. It is a fascinating thing to be very intensely mourning the passing of a teenage boy, a sweet and gentle soul you have known since he literally came to life, with the very public outpouring around the globe for a basketball icon who for some 20 years, since he came into all of our lives, inspired countless hopes and dreams.
Shayne’s mother, Lisa Hudson, my wife’s sister, was one of the early pioneers on the women’s pro beach volleyball circuit, and has for many years been active in the action sports industry. Her friends include Olympic medalists and skateboard legends, and they have rallied around her and her husband, Jack Rebbetoy. A GoFundMe campaign that asked for $10,000 (for grief therapy, among other things) is now five times past that; if you’d like to contribute, here’s the link.
Shayne Rebbetoy // photo by Kathleen Harrison
Kobe Bryant and daughter Gianna at the 2019 WNBA All-Star Game // Getty Images
Seemingly everyone everywhere — everything from murals in the Philippines to buses in LA sporting “RIP Kobe” — is feeling or searching for a connection to Kobe. Here, up in Marin County, immediately north of San Francisco, as friends and family have begun to gather for Saturday’s memorial, Kobe and basketball are not just a touchpoint but a reminder that life — living — the joy and beauty of feeling alive, the gift of being alive — is a thing to savor.
Friday brought high clouds and blue skies to the Bay Area. It was a picture-perfect day. The water under the Golden Gate Bridge was an aqua blue, the sailboats white in relief against the green Marin hills. it can be chilly in Marin in January. Friday was warm, and in the trees outside Lisa and Jack’s house, hummingbirds — plural — darted in and out.
Joe, Lisa’s and Laura’s younger brother, grew up a Laker fan. He wore purple and gold Laker socks all day Friday.
On Thursday, neighbors had brought food to the house — so much food, thank you — and the conversation inevitably turned to Kobe and some of his great shots and great Laker victories and then, because Jack and his family are Canadian, to last year’s NBA Finals, and the Toronto Raptors, and Kawhi Leonard, and how awesome it was for the Raptors to break through, and which was better, the Finals victory, or that crazy shot that Kawhi made, the four-bouncer on the rim to beat the Philadelphia 76ers and send the Raptors to the conference finals — or, let’s see, could this year’s Raptors beat this year’s Lakers with LeBron and Anthony Davis? And what about the Clippers with Kawhi?
And so on.
Back in Los Angeles, the Lakers are due Friday night to play their first game since the crash, at Staples Center against the Portland Trail Blazers.
It was a great privilege to cover Kobe at the 2008 and 2012 Games and, prediction, Tokyo this summer will be the Kobe Olympics, the U.S. team in particular seeking to pay tribute to Bryant — not just the basketball teams, the entire U.S. delegation.
Kobe Bryant understood the essence of the Olympics — that winning was the thing, yes, but being part of it was being part of something bigger.
As he said in a 2018 interview with the Aspen Institute:
“Sport is the vehicle through which we change the world. The next generation is going to carry this world forward. We have to teach our children how to be disciplined, use their imagination, understand empathy and compassion, and how to work well with others. Teach these things to them now and that will make the world a better place tomorrow. It’s really that simple. Change the world. That’s all. Not too much to ask.”
Shayne Rebbetoy was no Olympic superstar in the making. No basketball standout. Not hardly.
All the same, he had empathy and compassion, and imagination.
Now he is gone, far too soon. Like Kobe Bryant. Far too soon. Painfully, grievously too soon.
What to do? For each of us? All of us?
Be kinder and gentler.
The next generation — listen, maybe, to what they have to say when they show us that empathy and compassion.
Someone bought a skateboard and urged Shayne’s friends to write in Sharpie pens, yearbook-style, their tributes to him. It’s now in Lisa and Jack’s front room.
“My heart has a crack in it and only your smile can fix it.”
Another: “You were a shining light. Your kindness and generosity [were] unmatched.”
Yet another: “Shayne, you were such a pure and kind soul who went wayyy too soon Your selfless memory will be kept in the [hearts] of countless people. We will miss you dearly.”
They’re expecting 650 people at Saturday’s memorial. Who knows how many will be at whatever they hold for Kobe Bryant? Will it fill the LA Memorial Coliseum? It’s — all a reminder.
Every life matters.
And life is for living. And to tell each other that we love each other.
As Shaquille O’Neal said of Kobe:
“It definitely changes me. Because I work a lot. You guys know what I do I work probably more than the average guy. I just really now have to take time and call and say, I love you …
“I’m gonna try to do a better job of just reaching out and just talking to other people rather than always procrastinating because you never know.”