Ryan Everett Rojas

Magnificent Ryan Everett Rojas was born In Covina, California on May 27, 1987. Everyone who knew Ryan undoubtedly has many great memories of time spent with him in their heart. That is where he is now, in our hearts and in heaven with Jesus Christ his savior and king.

As we, his family, mourn his loss, we recall that even as a baby and young boy he was mischievous and funny. In his highchair he would dump his leftover food on his head. He would wear his little plastic sunglasses upside down and he always had to have a hat on or a cape so he could fly. Peter Pan was his favorite character and he spent hours jumping off the couch arms into the cushions placed on the floor. Ryan had a fearless love of adventure and travel. He was happiest when he could do things full throttle. Put him on a jet ski and he would take off, doing flips and spins, unable to get the thrill from just riding it.

He could never get enough, insatiable in his thirst for fun and happiness, he loved everything. He loved his family. He loved his friends. He loved his pets, sports, music, food, and beer. He was especially inspired by and loved God’s amazing world of nature and “natural beauty”. He traveled back and forth from New York to California many times and loved it every time whether he was on the road solo with just his trusty beagle to keep him company or with friends, or family. 

Always the life of the party Ryan drew people in and he made friends wherever he went, whatever he did. He loved people! Ryan lived life by the seat of his pants at times. In one of his writings he said this after a risky drive to California: “I guess what I should have learned from this experience is to be more prepared, but I didn’t. What I did learn is not to worry so much because whatever is supposed to happen will happen whether you think it is supposed to happen or not.”

Ryan pursued many things in his life, playing the guitar, filmmaking in New York City, underwater diving to become an underwater electrician. When he was in fourth grade he interviewed the school psychologist and decided it would be a great career for him because he would so love to help people by listening to them and understanding them. Ryan also wanted to be an actor and took a semester at Broome Community College in theater. He had a great singing voice and took vocal music that semester. He also had a writing class during that semester in which he excelled. Throughout the years his writing took a back seat to other things, but recently this year, he had been going through his written works and had developed a keen interest in rekindling his love of writing. This was one of his goals for the future as was traveling with his brother and sister, family and friends to see baseball games, concerts and new places. 

Ryan’s greatest achievement and one both he and we were most proud of was him becoming a Medical Specialist (Medic) in the United States Army, fearlessly representing his country in Afghanistan. Known by his comrades as “Doc” he not only healed the physical wounds but provided comedic relief and a bit of rabble rousing fun to his unit as you can read from his friends tributes on his Facebook page Ryan Rojas. He was always about lifting others up. That was just his way.

His brother Jason and sister Lydia were his heroes. He spent most of his time this year walking parks, running and working out with Jason. He was very proud of his sister for getting her nursing degree and had recently decided to follow in her footsteps to become a nurse. He has just started back at a private online college in the weeks preceding his untimely passing and he was so glad to be reading and learning again. 

Most significantly about Ryan’s life was his undying love for God, through Jesus Christ and in the past two months, I have witnessed Ryan reading his Army Bible every day for almost an hour. It has been an amazing thing to see and comforts me now. Ryan had many significant disappointments in his life but through each he remained faithful to God, hopeful and ready to start over again. His faith was incredible, though at times he thought he was too much of a sinner to make it to Heaven. I assured him that Jesus wants the sinners, loves the sinners, saves the sinners. You should know that too. Ryan would want you to know, there is always hope as long as you know Jesus. Ryan is with Him now. How great that is! I believe if Ryan had stayed here longer he would have become a published writer and that he would have found his career in service to people, using all the skill sets he had pursued along the way and including his sufferings and pain and drawing from his amazing ability to love and accept people for exactly who they are and where they are at. Here are some of Ryan’s own words that if you follow, you will most surely live a better, happier life. This was written 04/05/07:

“To make this world better, we need to care about each other; but we must not just say it, we must mean it. You must have an interest in people. You can’t just persecute someone and expect to get a good reaction from them. You have to get on the same page. You have to get inside of yourself and find something you can connect on and you have to be genuine for the reasons you are doing it. You have to consider their past and the people involved in their life. When a person is born, they are free from sin. One of the only things that doesn’t change about the person throughout their lifetime, is their eyes. So, I can tell when I look into someone’s eyes if there is still at least some good in them. Understanding is to not retaliate when somebody does something that gets on your last nerve, but to instead try to think about why they might have done it. Understanding is putting yourself in someone else’s shoes and trying to feel who the person is. Understanding is not getting mad at someone just because they have a completely different look on things than you.”   

In closing, more of Ryan’s own words dated 1/22/07:

“I don’t know how people see me because I am not them, but if I had to guess how they see me I would say they see me as friendly and fun to be with: a good friend. People like to be around me and the reason I know this is that my house is always filled with lots of my friends and I always have many calls waiting for me on the answering machine from friends who want to get together. My friends most likely see me as happy-go-lucky, fun loving and someone who values them and listens to their problems. This is true, but there is more to me, more to what I am about. I have serious goals and plans for my life which I yearn to make into reality. The fun loving, good listening part of me wants to be that and more and inside me there waits a writer, longing to come out. Someday, I will accomplish all my goals. I’m sure you have to be a pretty good writer to become a Psychologist, so it’s good that both of these goals go together. I hope to fulfill my goals by writing a book about my life someday so that people can read it and say, “this guy had a pretty cool life and he was a great guy!”

So maybe you didn’t get to write a physical book Ryan, but your amazing life was your story. You did listen to, understand and love all of us! So, in a very significant, real, and wonderful way you did accomplish your goal, because yes Ryan, you had a pretty cool life and you were/are a great guy! We are so proud of you Ryan Everett Rojas! We love you forever!