Graton pair's message to all who've lost children: there is hope

The headlines have been truly heart-shattering, harrowing.

“Family, friends mourn sisters killed in Petaluma River crash.”

“Two teens die in fiery crash west of Monte Rio.”

“Two sisters die after pickup plunges into Russian River near Jenner.”

The run of horrific Sonoma County road fatalities involving children strikes Dave and Patti Martinez of Graton differently than it does most other newspaper readers. That’s because late one night early in 2005, the couple’s only daughter, only two grandchildren and the youngsters’ father perished in a crash on rural Guerneville Road caused in part by a junker that was abandoned partially in the road.

With the sudden, violent deaths of Lauren Martinez, who was 25, her boyfriend Matthew Spencer, 27, and the little ones, Kailee, 7, and 5-year-old Cameron, it wouldn’t have surprised Dave and Patti Martinez had they never again smiled or laughed, or looked forward to a new day.

The two 65-year-olds believe it would please their lost loved ones that they’re now doing all those things. They’d like to suggest to those who suffer and grieve in the aftermath of the recent road tragedies that it is possible to feel alive again.

“It’s scary when you’re in the middle of it, to think there may be no way out of it,” Patti Martinez said from her and Dave’s kitchen table. “But there is.”

Of course, she and her husband will always miss their daughter and her family; the mourning is an ever-evolving process. But they say they’ve come a long way from the debilitating sorrow thanks to creative, hospice-assisted channeling of their grief and a determination not to compound the tragedy by allowing it to destroy their lives - and by a mission of loving service to others.

When their daughter and her partner and their children died on Jan. 24, 2005, they were in the midst of a temporary move from Chico to the Mexican village of Lo de Marcos, north of Puerto Vallarta. The Martinezes own a home there.

“They’d moved everything (from Chico) into our shed,” said Dave Martinez, who’s retired from vocational rehabilitation counseling, technical-career recruiting and real estate sales. “Everything is still there.”

Lauren Martinez and Spencer intended to treat their children to a foreign cultural experience that would expand their horizons and make them fluent in Spanish. Not long after the family was killed, Patti and Dave Martinez learned of an American artist in Lo de Marcos, Dulce Heinrich, who, along with her husband, Jim, was welcoming local children into their home for after-school art instruction and homework help.

A idea presented itself. The Martinezes had pulled together a few thousand dollars to invest in a memorial tribute to their daughter and her family.

What if they were to help expand the Heinrichs’ enrichment program for the children of Lo de Marcos?

The two couples rented a storefront in the town and founded La Casa de los Niños. When they opened the doors in December of 2005, less than a year after the tragedy on Guerneville Road, “We had 80 kids waiting,” Dave Martinez said.

More than 10 years later, La Casa de los Niños occupies on old but adequate house. It’s a legally organized nonprofit that employs a staff of four teachers and each school day welcomes in about 50 children who use the free program’s computers for homework, take art and English classes and make use of the library, music and game rooms and kitchen.

The Martinezes travel there from Sonoma County three or four times a year. To assist and enjoy the kids, aged 6 to 14, said Patti Martinez, who owns the Sebastopol Physical Therapy and Pilates Center, “is basically what we would be doing as grandparents.”

She and her husband also are helping to plan an annual fundraiser for the program that happens from 6 to 10 p.m. Oct. 15 at Sierra Nevada’s brewery in Chico. There will be live music and ample opportunity to learn more about the after-school program that honors the memory of the Martinezes’ family and the Heinrichs’ son, Fernando, who succumbed to leukemia in 2008.

The Graton couple doesn’t expect that others who’ve lost children, grandchildren and other loved ones will necessarily reclaim their joy by founding a charitable program the likes of La Casa de los Niños. But they’ve discovered through that mission and also through art and hospice therapy that it is possible, following the devastation of a fatal crash, to rediscover hope and happiness.

“The first year, you might not even be able to hear any of that,” Patti Martinez said.

But time moves on.

Chris Smith is at 521-5211 and chris.smith@pressdemocrat.com.