Speaker 1: Hello, my friend, welcome back. Have I got a sweet
Speaker 1: treat for you on today's episode? In this podcast, I
Speaker 1: talked to people, ordinary people who are doing extraordinary things
Speaker 1: in the hopes that their stories will resonate deep within you,
Speaker 1: will jostle something loose that you'll say, Hey, if they
Speaker 1: can do that, I can certainly use my gift to
Speaker 1: change the world. Whatever this is my guest today are
Speaker 1: going to blow you away. After hearing their story, you
Speaker 1: are going to realize that absolutely no obstacle, no challenge,
Speaker 1: no hardship, no fear is too mighty to overcome. David
Speaker 1: is a bright, talented, handsome young man, full of unbridled
Speaker 1: enthusiasm for life and the Lord. He's the kind of
Speaker 1: guy folks look at and think, dudes got it all.
Speaker 1: And David grew up in Knoxville, Tennessee. He was an
Speaker 1: active kid. He loved music, He attended church, he played sports.
Speaker 1: He did well in school. He went off to college,
Speaker 1: graduated with a degree in electrical engineering, and then went
Speaker 1: to start his career. But soon realized music was what
Speaker 1: he was really excited about, and so, in one of
Speaker 1: his first courageous moves, he quit a job that was
Speaker 1: paying the bills and started teaching piano and guitar lessons
Speaker 1: and dabbling in music production out of a studio he
Speaker 1: built in his bedroom. And then a few years later,
Speaker 1: in April, back in sixteen, he did another courageous thing.
Speaker 1: He packed up and he moved to Nashville to attend
Speaker 1: the Blackbird Academy. He wanted to become the best music
Speaker 1: producer that he could possibly be. He got an apartment,
Speaker 1: he had a few belongings, he had a lot of
Speaker 1: enthusism as him, and he had a bicycle. Twenty three
Speaker 1: days after he started classes, it happened the unthinkable. David
Speaker 1: and his bride, Christie, who plays a very important role
Speaker 1: in their story, are with me today to talk about
Speaker 1: what true courage looks like, what true faith looks like.
Speaker 1: This is gonna be real, it's gonna be raw, it's
Speaker 1: gonna be powerful, and I know it's going to inspire
Speaker 1: your heart. Before we get into it, though, we need
Speaker 1: to first take a moment to thank my podcast sponsor,
Speaker 1: the Home Depot. I've been shopping at the Home Depot
Speaker 1: for longer than I care to admit, certainly longer than
Speaker 1: they've been a sponsor of this podcast or my radio program.
Speaker 1: I shot there because I find what I'm looking for
Speaker 1: in the garden department, in the paint department. When it's
Speaker 1: time for a new appliance in my home. It's my
Speaker 1: go to place and it has been for a long
Speaker 1: long time. Make the home depot your destination when you
Speaker 1: need something for your home. The home depot where doers
Speaker 1: get more done. Hi David, Hello Christie, thank you for
Speaker 1: being with us today. You have such an amazing story
Speaker 1: to tell. I've given the back story and I'm gonna
Speaker 1: let you take it from there. Tell us what happened
Speaker 1: less than a month after making that big move. Yes,
Speaker 1: I had been biking through Nashville, loving it, and I
Speaker 1: get to the last intersection to my house and I
Speaker 1: got t boned at about thirty five by Volvo. Smashed
Speaker 1: into the windshield, My head smashed against the top of
Speaker 1: the car. Fortunately, think the lord I had a helmet on. Okay,
Speaker 1: stop right there, Stop right there. Kids, young people, if
Speaker 1: you are listening, especially my young people, when Mama Bear
Speaker 1: says where you're dang helmet? This is why, this is why,
Speaker 1: what would have happened had you not listen to your
Speaker 1: Mama Bear and didn't have your helmet on. Oh, I
Speaker 1: wouldn't be alive. And it's crazy. Actually, there's a story
Speaker 1: behind the helmet that I'll share briefly. Um, I actually
Speaker 1: didn't have it in Nashville. I had forgotten it, um,
Speaker 1: and it was in my hometown of Knoxville, Tennessee. But
Speaker 1: just three days before the crash, I was at home,
Speaker 1: driving away from my parents house forgetting it again, and
Speaker 1: the thought just popped in my head. I call it
Speaker 1: whatever you want, but I think it was the voice
Speaker 1: of God, and it just said, go get the helmet.
Speaker 1: I turned around and I got the helmet. And then
Speaker 1: literally three days later I was in this crash that
Speaker 1: without the helmet I would have probably died. So did
Speaker 1: the driver just not see the red light? So what
Speaker 1: actually happened was she was a a heavy drug user
Speaker 1: at the time. We don't know if she was on
Speaker 1: drugs when she was driving, but she was hearing voices
Speaker 1: in her head off of her bipolar medication, not in
Speaker 1: the right state of mind, and so um, really she
Speaker 1: she just said it came out of nowhere and and
Speaker 1: it was a bad choice on her part to drive
Speaker 1: that day. So you were hit head into the windshield
Speaker 1: and then what happened. I actually don't remember anything from
Speaker 1: the crash. This is all just what's been told to me.
Speaker 1: But my body apparently went a hundred feet is what
Speaker 1: I was told. Um. I was unconscious, bleeding out from
Speaker 1: my arm, which had smashed the windshield, and um, some
Speaker 1: people came over prayed over me. Um, and I started
Speaker 1: coming to a little bit after someone put a tourniquet
Speaker 1: on my arm made out of someone else's belt. God's
Speaker 1: angels just coming around and yeah, so somebody at the
Speaker 1: scene of the accident had the good sense to say,
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, he kind of madejor artery. It looks
Speaker 1: like he's bleeding out. Ironically, it was a Jimmy John's
Speaker 1: driver stops the car, leaves the sandwiches in the back
Speaker 1: and just comes over. Turns out she's going to medical
Speaker 1: school the next fall, and so she yeah, she knew
Speaker 1: exactly what to do. Saves me from a blood transfusion,
Speaker 1: if not just bleeding out. I got to meet her
Speaker 1: later and it was what's the name of this hero,
Speaker 1: Let's give her and Jimmy John's a shout out, Yeah,
Speaker 1: Cecily Hummer, and we still keep in touch. So Cecily
Speaker 1: and Angel Sin at the right place at the right time. Yeah,
Speaker 1: all right, so now you're you're awake. No, I don't
Speaker 1: really remember being awake. I'm I am starting to say
Speaker 1: I can't move, I can't feel my legs. I can't
Speaker 1: move my legs. Um. My first memory actually is after
Speaker 1: they had already taken me from the scene to the
Speaker 1: hospital and and I wake up in the hospital and
Speaker 1: I I realized my parents were there. I didn't realize
Speaker 1: they had driven three hours from Knoxville to get there,
Speaker 1: so it must have been a while. And I asked,
Speaker 1: why are my legs off the bed? And uh, and
Speaker 1: they said, well, your legs are on the bed. And
Speaker 1: I was like, what do you mean? And I looked
Speaker 1: down and there's my legs sitting on the bed, but
Speaker 1: I couldn't feel them. And then I tried to move
Speaker 1: them and I couldn't move them. And then the first
Speaker 1: moment I really knew something was wrong. And it turns
Speaker 1: out that I had had a spinal cord injury, which
Speaker 1: basically means you can't control anything or feel anything from
Speaker 1: below the point of impact, and mine was at the
Speaker 1: l one level, which is mid lower back, so everything
Speaker 1: below that point basically has no more function. And that
Speaker 1: was definitely the worst of my injuries that day. And
Speaker 1: do you remember what went through your head at that moment.
Speaker 1: I'm pretty sure I said something like, I guess life
Speaker 1: is going to be different. But honestly, it can't really
Speaker 1: hit you a trauma like that. I was on pain
Speaker 1: medication and had a severe concussion, and so I don't
Speaker 1: think it really hit me in that moment. But over
Speaker 1: the next few days and weeks and turned into months, actually,
Speaker 1: I really kept learning the new implications of what it
Speaker 1: was going to mean for my life. And what did
Speaker 1: the doctors tell you when you were finally healed enough
Speaker 1: and coherent enough to hear what they had to say.
Speaker 1: The prognosis after an m R I was, it's so bad,
Speaker 1: it's a complete injury. He's never gonna walk again. Neurological
Speaker 1: recovery is unlikely, is what they said. So they actually
Speaker 1: waited until the next morning to do the surgery to
Speaker 1: put eight screws and two rods into my back. Maybe
Speaker 1: the next day is when they told me it's a
Speaker 1: complete injury. People don't really walk after this. That had
Speaker 1: to be the hardest, scariest, most painful thing. Any young man,
Speaker 1: any person could hear, any mama could hear. Was your
Speaker 1: mom with you when they were sharing this? Well, yes,
Speaker 1: I mean I was going through a lot of pain.
Speaker 1: But the first few days were probably the hardest for
Speaker 1: my family. UM, My mom and dad immediately drove to
Speaker 1: Nashville when they heard. They got a call from my
Speaker 1: cell phone, but it was a lady at the scene
Speaker 1: of the crash that said I would come if I
Speaker 1: was you, which, if you can imagine getting that phone call, Hey, Daves,
Speaker 1: is what my mom said. And then it's this lady's voice,
Speaker 1: and she said it was the worst call you could get.
Speaker 1: But as I started processing it, yeah, I I grieved.
Speaker 1: I probably cried every day for the first four months
Speaker 1: just because of how much loss I was experiencing and
Speaker 1: it was just overwhelming. So how many months were you
Speaker 1: in the hospital just learning how to set up and
Speaker 1: manage the pain? So a total of eight months in
Speaker 1: the hospital, and the first I would say three months
Speaker 1: were full time nurses taking care of me, learning how
Speaker 1: to live, learning how to get out of bed, learning
Speaker 1: how to get dressed, learning how to shower. It's actually
Speaker 1: really hard um at first, because you you've got too
Speaker 1: deadweights attached to your hips and you got to pull
Speaker 1: them around and they literally don't move. But at of
Speaker 1: the first two months or so of of being full
Speaker 1: time nurse is taking care of me being in the hospital,
Speaker 1: I started becoming pretty independent, and then I eventually started
Speaker 1: seeing some movement, which was really amazing. Okay, stop right there,
Speaker 1: because because this is this is big, this is huge, right.
Speaker 1: It's funny, actually I was. I was on the phone
Speaker 1: with a friend one night in the hospital, in the
Speaker 1: like the hospital bed with you know, the nurses still
Speaker 1: kind of taking care of me, and I'm always trying
Speaker 1: to move my legs but nothing ever happens. But they
Speaker 1: they've told me about this idea of neuroplasticity. If you
Speaker 1: think about sending the signal to your leg, it can
Speaker 1: possibly regenerate a pathway or find another way to get there.
Speaker 1: John was always thinking about it. And then on the
Speaker 1: phone one night with a friend, I'm looking down and
Speaker 1: thinking about moving my legs, and all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: I'm like, wait, is my foot moving? And I'm I
Speaker 1: literally told him like, dude, I think my foot's moving,
Speaker 1: and and it was so small that I all the
Speaker 1: nurse in just to confirm, and she was like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think it's moving a little bit. And so then
Speaker 1: I called my parents and who were still literally living
Speaker 1: at the hospital, and they came in, and this is
Speaker 1: this is a month after the crash, so it's been
Speaker 1: a month of zero movement, and so when they came in,
Speaker 1: we all celebrated, even though obviously it wasn't walking. It
Speaker 1: was literally one twitch in one part of my lower extremities.
Speaker 1: We'll take a twitch, right, So that was amazing. It's
Speaker 1: our first little sign of hope. So as a musician,
Speaker 1: did you just feel like bursting into song at that moment?
Speaker 1: And brazen? God, here's where I ended up at a
Speaker 1: place where I turned off long term thoughts. He was
Speaker 1: so dark and depressing at the beginning. I had to say,
Speaker 1: I'm not going to think about a year from now.
Speaker 1: I'm not even going to think about six months from now.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna focus on today and what the therapists are
Speaker 1: asking me to do, and I'm gonna just do my
Speaker 1: best today. So when I saw the first movement, it
Speaker 1: was great, this happened, It's amazing. But I think that
Speaker 1: I was also focused on just every day let's keep
Speaker 1: working and see what happens. And how much longer after
Speaker 1: that did you? You said you were in the hospital
Speaker 1: eight months, so you you had to have stayed there
Speaker 1: quite a bit longer. Yeah, So it was a month
Speaker 1: and when I had the first movement, and then over
Speaker 1: the next few weeks, I really started seeing exponential growth,
Speaker 1: just movement in my right but a few days later,
Speaker 1: and then a few days later my hamstring could kind
Speaker 1: of flex, and they had said that there's spinal swelling
Speaker 1: that goes down. After about eight weeks, I just kept
Speaker 1: seeing recovery. And when I was in Nashville, I was
Speaker 1: going to the Audio School. We were thinking about going back,
Speaker 1: but because I was getting this movement, we decided to
Speaker 1: be better to actually stay at the Shepherd Center where
Speaker 1: I was doing my therapy and a program called Beyond Therapy.
Speaker 1: It's really more like athletic training than therapy. But but
Speaker 1: they had me the first week, and keep in mind
Speaker 1: I had a couple of things switching, but they had
Speaker 1: me on my knees, crawling like a baby. They had
Speaker 1: me actually on a bicycle with my legs kind of
Speaker 1: strapped into the pedals and zero resistance um and again
Speaker 1: all of this is because of the idea of neuroplasticity,
Speaker 1: the idea that you can possibly regenerate pathways, and so
Speaker 1: that's what we focused on. And I did that program
Speaker 1: for the next six months. So yeah, eight months total
Speaker 1: of therapy, and by the end of that I was
Speaker 1: actually walking on forearm crushes. Wow. Now where does the
Speaker 1: young woman sitting in the studio with you? Where does
Speaker 1: she enter the picture? Ah? She and there's one month
Speaker 1: before the crash. Actually, you want to tell about it, Christie. Yes.
Speaker 1: So I was actually in Nashville visiting friends for a
Speaker 1: wedding and one of the friends I was visiting he
Speaker 1: was playing in a show and it just so happened
Speaker 1: that David was also in the band that night, and
Speaker 1: we all just clicked and um hung out that night
Speaker 1: and they were just band members. So I actually never
Speaker 1: heard David sing, but he was such a light it
Speaker 1: was really uplifting. Um. So then I leave Nashville, I
Speaker 1: go back to California and I start listening to David's
Speaker 1: own music and it was so funny because I shared
Speaker 1: with all my friends and my family and my mom. Actually,
Speaker 1: after she listened to his album, she said, you need
Speaker 1: to find a guy that speaks the way that this
Speaker 1: guy sings. Wait, stop right there, Christie. I felt connected
Speaker 1: to David through his music, the fact that he's adorable.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, his picture was on the CD I had.
Speaker 1: He was very cute. We had one moment that night
Speaker 1: at the at the show where she's like, do you
Speaker 1: ever put your hair in a man butt? And I'm like, yeah,
Speaker 1: sometimes I put it up, and we kind of looked
Speaker 1: at each other for just a little bit longer than
Speaker 1: I was like, no, got me. He can rock the
Speaker 1: man bun. Wow, thank you. Yeah, Yeah, you're so adorable.
Speaker 1: I listened to some of those songs and Christie, You're right,
Speaker 1: he does. He does speak to the heart of people. Okay,
Speaker 1: so you had met before the accident and then what happened.
Speaker 1: So then about a month and a half later was
Speaker 1: when the crash happened, and Gideon our mutual friends. He
Speaker 1: texts me saying, hey, can you pray for David. He's
Speaker 1: been in the crash, And my stomach just drops through
Speaker 1: the floor. And so I called Gideon and he updates me,
Speaker 1: and I remember that first night so vividly. We just
Speaker 1: were crying over the phone over David and you know,
Speaker 1: kind of a little angry at the situation about why him,
Speaker 1: Like he's such a good person, why does this have
Speaker 1: to be his fate? And uh, and then I remember thinking,
Speaker 1: wait a minute, I've met this guy one time. Why
Speaker 1: am I so affected by it? But it's not like
Speaker 1: he was one of my good friends or family members.
Speaker 1: But I think that was the push from God saying, no,
Speaker 1: you are meant to be connected to this human It's
Speaker 1: okay to feel so now I have to rewind for
Speaker 1: a second, because during the time of me listening to
Speaker 1: his music, I really wanted to reach out and tell
Speaker 1: him how much it was impacting me. And I knew
Speaker 1: he was moving to Nashville, so I was going to
Speaker 1: write a letter, a type of encouragement letter. However, I
Speaker 1: never wrote it because I felt like it had come
Speaker 1: off creepy or weird. Then the crash happened, and then
Speaker 1: I was regretful. Well, then I started having dreams about
Speaker 1: words and letters and reaching out to David, and uh,
Speaker 1: finally I woke up literally at five am in the morning,
Speaker 1: and I just wrote and I sent. I actually sent
Speaker 1: two letters. One had the theme of encouraging him in
Speaker 1: his music, and the other was just trying to encourage
Speaker 1: him in his new situation. Um, and so I think
Speaker 1: he received them well and we still have it, which
Speaker 1: is awesome. And what was your response. I was very
Speaker 1: encouraged and kind of um impressed with this amazing letter
Speaker 1: from this girl in California. We were kind of in
Speaker 1: our own spaces, but I would I would watch the
Speaker 1: social media videos that his parents would post, and Gideon
Speaker 1: would update me and whatnot. So basically, you were stalking
Speaker 1: him from California without letting him know that. Absolutely, okay,
Speaker 1: just just making sure I understand where you're at here.
Speaker 1: So I had a crazy dream that summer. Again, the
Speaker 1: first one is about the letters. The second one, I
Speaker 1: actually had a dream of David walking. And in the dream,
Speaker 1: David is walking down this path or aisle, and at
Speaker 1: the end of the aisle, he turns around and I'm
Speaker 1: at the other end of the aisle, and you can
Speaker 1: guess that it's a wedding. And I wake up the
Speaker 1: next day freaking out. I'm like, I just had not
Speaker 1: only a dream of David walking, but of me marrying David.
Speaker 1: I've talked to this guy one time, and then finally
Speaker 1: I get a message from David that he's coming out
Speaker 1: to California. We have so much more to cover. Let's
Speaker 1: take a breath and pause for this message. Okay, David,
Speaker 1: where did we leave off? So I'm coming to California.
Speaker 1: I first of all, I should just explain I had
Speaker 1: amazing support from friends, family, and even more than that,
Speaker 1: the music community. I was invited to the audio school,
Speaker 1: Blackbird Academy, on a full ride. If you can get
Speaker 1: back here, we'll build wheelchair ramps for him. Martina McBride
Speaker 1: and her husband John are actually the owners of the school,
Speaker 1: and they have an incredible program, an amazing place, and
Speaker 1: just shows you the kind of people they are over there.
Speaker 1: But all that to say, another piece of encouragement I
Speaker 1: got in the music community was from this show called
Speaker 1: Pintado's Place. It's a TV show on YouTube where they
Speaker 1: interview famous mixers and producers and engineers, the guys behind
Speaker 1: the scenes in the audio industry. And so one day
Speaker 1: the Blackbird Academy, Uh, some of our friends, they're actually
Speaker 1: sent out the video of one of the episodes, and
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh cool, I love the show. I wonder
Speaker 1: why they're sending this to me. So we start watching
Speaker 1: it and all of a sudden, they start talking about
Speaker 1: me on their show. Hey, send all your Pensatian powers
Speaker 1: to our friend David who was injured in this crash. Um, bro,
Speaker 1: We're with you, We're gonna support you. Blah blah blah.
Speaker 1: I was freaking out because like, these are my dudes
Speaker 1: that I've been watching for years and trying to learn
Speaker 1: how to mix through um. And then not only that,
Speaker 1: but then later they reached out directly to my dad
Speaker 1: and said, hey, we want to have David come out
Speaker 1: for our awards show in California. Four months after I've
Speaker 1: been paralyzed in this crash. I'm flying out still, you know,
Speaker 1: in a wheelchair pretty much full time, UM to California
Speaker 1: to go to this award show called the Pensado Awards.
Speaker 1: Well it was an amazing event, um, but I guess
Speaker 1: I should explain. When I landed, I'm like, l A,
Speaker 1: this is so exciting, this is so cool. Wait that
Speaker 1: chick who sent me that letter doesn't she live here?
Speaker 1: Wait a man, at hold on? I remember, yeah exactly.
Speaker 1: I hit her up on Facebook Messenger because I don't
Speaker 1: even have her number, And I say, yo, first of all,
Speaker 1: been me to thank you for about eternity and for
Speaker 1: for your letter, and second of all, I'm in l
Speaker 1: a are you around? It was so vague and so bad.
Speaker 1: I'm still embarrassed. Um. But and because you already had
Speaker 1: her at the man Bun, and because she's already dreamed
Speaker 1: the dream of your wedding. Instead of saying, what a
Speaker 1: rude jerk, You've gone all this time without answering, no, no,
Speaker 1: I'm not around, she said. Oh, I was ecstatic. But
Speaker 1: the ironic thing was, I was actually how of the country.
Speaker 1: I was in Guatemala on a missions trip. I was
Speaker 1: like out of all the time using California, I'm literally
Speaker 1: out of the country. However, we realized that I was
Speaker 1: going to get back late the night before he was
Speaker 1: going to leave, and so we literally had a few
Speaker 1: hours on a Sunday morning that I could go meet
Speaker 1: up for coffee. So there was a meet up. I
Speaker 1: was a little nervous because I haven't seen him since
Speaker 1: that concert back in March, when he was fully able bodied.
Speaker 1: I hadn't seen him in a wheelchair. I didn't know
Speaker 1: exactly how this was going to go. So he is
Speaker 1: rolling out of the hotel and I'm crossing the street
Speaker 1: and I kid you not, and he had that his
Speaker 1: hair in a main bun. My first thought was crap,
Speaker 1: I forgot how good looking he was even see the wheelchair.
Speaker 1: I just saw his face. But we hugged and she
Speaker 1: came in and we just caught up like old friends.
Speaker 1: It really felt it was crazy, yeah, like and so
Speaker 1: it was great until my dad started inserting himself into
Speaker 1: the conversation and ends up it's her and my dad
Speaker 1: talking and I'm like, what is going on here? I'm
Speaker 1: trying to talk to the girl, and my dad is
Speaker 1: jack the conversation right away from you in the conversation.
Speaker 1: So um. So it's funny now that we look back,
Speaker 1: because he actually did turn out to be a wing
Speaker 1: man and invited her to a festival in San Diego
Speaker 1: that we were going to the next month. So anyway,
Speaker 1: a month goes by, but I was in the friend zone,
Speaker 1: she was in the resident So we go to this
Speaker 1: music festival and it was pretty pivotal in our friendship.
Speaker 1: I would say, uh everyone. For me, first of all,
Speaker 1: my eyes were open to the world of the handicapped
Speaker 1: because I would help push David in his wheelchair, and
Speaker 1: all of a sudden everything was an obstacle. Course, so
Speaker 1: it just really humbled me. And now I'm I'm very
Speaker 1: much hyper aware, and I'm glad for that lesson that
Speaker 1: I learned. And of course we get to know each other.
Speaker 1: And one time, luckily David's dad, he snuck away, but
Speaker 1: he came back and took pictures of us behind our backs.
Speaker 1: Dad's good. Yeah, he believe when he has a vision
Speaker 1: for something, he makes it happen. So Dad had already
Speaker 1: started naming the grandkids. He literally texted his wife, Mitsy,
Speaker 1: my mother in law, a picture of us, and said,
Speaker 1: I think this is David's future wife, Like he knew
Speaker 1: at that moment. So David, everybody's kind of a step
Speaker 1: ahead of you. It sounds like, yeah, basically, David, you
Speaker 1: didn't stand a chance. Yeah. So I said something like
Speaker 1: I really like you and I look forward to seeing
Speaker 1: where this goes, because I didn't know what else to say. Really,
Speaker 1: It's like, I want to tell her that I like her,
Speaker 1: but I also don't know what's next. We started writing
Speaker 1: letters back and forth. So a month goes by from
Speaker 1: after this correspondence, so I actually go out to visit
Speaker 1: him in Nashville and we go to the place where
Speaker 1: we're gonna stay, and David's kind of like weirdly excited
Speaker 1: about I don't know, and I just was like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: he's excited that I'm here. But we get to the
Speaker 1: airbnb and he finally says, oh, I would love to
Speaker 1: play music for you, and I I'm like, heck yes,
Speaker 1: And then finally he says, well, I should warn you
Speaker 1: this song is about you. And then I was like,
Speaker 1: what one of my favorite songs actually, and you can
Speaker 1: go here it on Spotify, Apple Music, iTunes, all the things.
Speaker 1: It's called She makes you want to sing? And I
Speaker 1: played it for her. She was like so joyful, just smiling,
Speaker 1: beaming the whole time. And you can imagine I was
Speaker 1: a girl who fell in love with his music months
Speaker 1: ago and then here I am listening to this guy
Speaker 1: playing a song about me. So that's when we both
Speaker 1: kind of knew, okay, like this is definitely something. And
Speaker 1: you know, by the end of that trip, I literally
Speaker 1: dropped her off at the airport and cried the entire
Speaker 1: thirty minute drive home, just thankful to God. Honestly, like
Speaker 1: that he redeemed relationships when I thought there was no hope,
Speaker 1: And you know, David will tell people about the redemption
Speaker 1: parts of his story, and one of them is the
Speaker 1: love and the relationships. One of him, obviously is his
Speaker 1: physical journey and the journey back to music. But then
Speaker 1: there's also the driver and her redemptive story that we
Speaker 1: might be able to get to too. Tell me, tell me,
Speaker 1: tell me, tell me. Because you shared that she was
Speaker 1: an active addict, dabbling mental illness, probably self medicating, yep
Speaker 1: was was so depressed after the crash that she actually overdosed,
Speaker 1: trying to kill herself and woke up in the hospital
Speaker 1: kind of like I woke up in the hospital, UM
Speaker 1: with a second chance and said I gotta do something
Speaker 1: about this. UM. So she actually ended up going to
Speaker 1: a halfway house, becoming clean, facing our fears. UM. But
Speaker 1: what's crazy is UM and a lot of people, I
Speaker 1: guess tell me this is crazy. It felt natural to me,
Speaker 1: is when I woke up and they told me what happened.
Speaker 1: I was concerned for her. I was wondering, is she
Speaker 1: going to be okay? If if I had done that
Speaker 1: to someone unintentionally, I would be devastated. So tell her
Speaker 1: that I'll be all right, Tell her that I forgive her.
Speaker 1: Tell her that I'm going to get through this, so
Speaker 1: it's okay. Um, and that was yeah, I think really
Speaker 1: powerful for her. Wow. Yeah, so you you fall in love,
Speaker 1: you decide to spend your life together, and then there
Speaker 1: is the proposal. Yea, the proposal. I knew. I wanted
Speaker 1: to try to surprise her and uh don't know how
Speaker 1: it was going to happen, But when we were going
Speaker 1: to Tennessee, we ended up going kayaking this one day. Um. Secretly,
Speaker 1: I had taken her to coffee earlier that day and
Speaker 1: my family had decorated this peninsula and her family, who
Speaker 1: her parents, were in town. My parents were in town
Speaker 1: because David had just graduated from the Blackbird Academy program.
Speaker 1: So it's natural that everyone was there. So I didn't
Speaker 1: think anything of it that both of the families are there,
Speaker 1: I should be suspicious. No, we're just celebrating David, so continue.
Speaker 1: So So anyway, I took her to coffee while they
Speaker 1: decorated the peninsula, and then we end up um saying
Speaker 1: all right, we're gonna go kayaking, which was Christie's idea,
Speaker 1: which made it super easy. So we go kayaking, and
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, we're going by the peninsula and
Speaker 1: I'm like, there's lights on the ground. I'm like, check
Speaker 1: that out. That's interesting, and my first spot. I don't
Speaker 1: know why, it goes to, oh my gosh, what weird
Speaker 1: people are having a seance in the forest always be
Speaker 1: and I'm not out. I didn't really scared. I'm like,
Speaker 1: keep paddling, keep paddling. What I thought? And David's like, no,
Speaker 1: there's no you should go check it out. And I'm like,
Speaker 1: she's seriously going to miss her proposal because she's scared
Speaker 1: of lights in a forest. So then he finally convinced
Speaker 1: me to go over there. He's like, this is where
Speaker 1: I used to play as a kid. I want to
Speaker 1: show it to you, and so I'm like okay. So
Speaker 1: we get closer and there's conveniently this woulden ramp because
Speaker 1: David is still pretty weak, and so he was able
Speaker 1: to kind of toss himself on the ramp and go up. Later,
Speaker 1: I found out that neighborhood boy and David's dad built
Speaker 1: that ramp just for the proposal because they knew David
Speaker 1: would need help to get out of it. But yeah,
Speaker 1: it was. It was awesome. So then we get off
Speaker 1: of the ramp, and we start walking on this little peninsula.
Speaker 1: But then I see rose pedals and more lights on
Speaker 1: the ground and I'm like what, and David I'm like yeah.
Speaker 1: I'm like, wow, this looks like it was made for
Speaker 1: two people who are madly and left. And then she's
Speaker 1: like what, and I'm like, this looks like it was
Speaker 1: made for us. And then I'm not even kidding you.
Speaker 1: For the next four hours, it seemed like I wept.
Speaker 1: I was beside myself with happy emotional tears. And we
Speaker 1: walked down the peninsula and there's this beautiful heart made
Speaker 1: out of tool and a bench with the roads and
Speaker 1: the ringbox, and I'm weeping and we sit on the
Speaker 1: bench and then David was able to transfer from the
Speaker 1: bench to his knee to propose, which I found out
Speaker 1: later the bench was my mom's idea because he was
Speaker 1: thinking I'll just fall to the ground. And so then
Speaker 1: he proposes, and I say, yes, yes, yes, this freaking out.
Speaker 1: This whole videos on YouTube, but yes, and you'll hear
Speaker 1: me crying. I found my way to you becau as
Speaker 1: of that video. That is how I found my way
Speaker 1: to you too. Well. After he proposed, then I hear
Speaker 1: a lad explosion and fireworks are going off in the
Speaker 1: middle of the lake. And I love fireworks. I've always
Speaker 1: loved fireworks. I work at Disney now, that's where I dance,
Speaker 1: and you know there's fireworks there. So it's just something
Speaker 1: that he knew that I liked. And so the kid
Speaker 1: that had also helped at the ramp had also been
Speaker 1: secretly in the lake on a paddle boat and at
Speaker 1: the right queue, I guess he jumped into the water
Speaker 1: and set off the fireworks that were on the paddle
Speaker 1: boat from the water, like these people are committed. And
Speaker 1: so then the fireworks go off, and then John boats
Speaker 1: everyone else over, including David's nine year old grandma, who
Speaker 1: was just a matriarch, and she says this beautiful prayer
Speaker 1: over us. And the best part was when David's mom
Speaker 1: and David's best friend emerged from the wood. It's in camouflage.
Speaker 1: They had been taking video and pictures the whole time,
Speaker 1: and I was like, oh my gosh, that's awesome. And
Speaker 1: then he moved out to California. When we planned the
Speaker 1: wedding and got married February two thousand eighteen, we're meant
Speaker 1: to be a team, and we found purpose together so
Speaker 1: well that and and the man Bun Yes, and the
Speaker 1: man Bun started with the man bun. So, so what
Speaker 1: is God doing since since the proposal, since the wedding,
Speaker 1: with the music, with your your producing? Where are you
Speaker 1: guys at today? And you know, the whole purpose of
Speaker 1: this podcast is to inspire other people to find that
Speaker 1: gift that they have inside and use it to change
Speaker 1: the world for good. The things that have come from
Speaker 1: this tragedy just keep getting crazier and crazier. I actually
Speaker 1: um wrote the book Lion Heart, which we kind of
Speaker 1: mentioned earlier, and and an album that goes with it
Speaker 1: about the whole journey. Um I had started writing songs
Speaker 1: a month or two into the crash, and she kept
Speaker 1: writing songs and they all kind of had to do
Speaker 1: with the journey I had been on, and so an
Speaker 1: album pretty quickly emerged. And then one day a friend
Speaker 1: told me, hey, you should write a book, and I
Speaker 1: was like, you know what, Like normally I would just
Speaker 1: laugh and be like whatever, and you know, you move on,
Speaker 1: but I actually stayed on that for a little bit
Speaker 1: and I was like, you know what, I think I'm
Speaker 1: going to And it took a year or two, but
Speaker 1: finally I finished, and we got editors to actually make
Speaker 1: me sound coherent. And it's called called Lion Heart, An
Speaker 1: Inspiring Story of Love, Forgiveness, and the Power of Music
Speaker 1: by David Francisco. So each chapter of the book is
Speaker 1: a song title, and I was able to structure in
Speaker 1: a way to where if you read the chapter and
Speaker 1: then you listen to the song, you'll have more kind
Speaker 1: of insight into how I wrote it and why, and
Speaker 1: so I think it will be a really interesting experience
Speaker 1: for the reader. But not only that, I mean another
Speaker 1: crazy piece that's come into this whole thing to give
Speaker 1: me purpose it is I've actually started speaking to high
Speaker 1: schoolers about distracted driving and I share my story. I
Speaker 1: get to play music, and I go around the country
Speaker 1: now and I and I share it and the kids
Speaker 1: just love it. It's it's amazing how many positive responses
Speaker 1: I've gotten from them, And it really feels like I've
Speaker 1: found something that's really it aligns all of my different
Speaker 1: passions into one thing where I get to communicate through
Speaker 1: music and words and and get to connect with people
Speaker 1: all over and so that's another really cool development. Um
Speaker 1: So these days life looks like working on the book
Speaker 1: and the album, finishing up the stuff for that, and
Speaker 1: then going on these little week long trips to different
Speaker 1: schools around the country and for you, Christie. So I
Speaker 1: actually get to travel with David quite a bit, which
Speaker 1: is wonderful. We get to sing together, and I'll share
Speaker 1: part of the story as well. I'm so proud of you, guys.
Speaker 1: I'm so happy for you, Thank you, thank you so much. Well,
Speaker 1: good luck and God bless you. From the day of
Speaker 1: the crash, with David keeping his faith through therapy and complications,
Speaker 1: then embracing the belief that love is what keeps us alive,
Speaker 1: marrying his soul mate Christie thanks to his wingman Dad,
Speaker 1: all these things pointing to the future, a future focused
Speaker 1: on music and redemption. David's book was born. Lion Heart,
Speaker 1: just released befittingly on Valentine's Day February. It just so
Speaker 1: happens that Lion Heart is also my book Club Pick
Speaker 1: of the Month for February. You can find out more
Speaker 1: about that at Delilah dot com. Lion Heart is a
Speaker 1: movement with the aim of empowering people to find purpose
Speaker 1: in their transit. Go to David's website, David Francisco Music
Speaker 1: dot com David Francisco, f R A, n C I,
Speaker 1: s c O, and order the book and the music CD.
Speaker 1: I promise you'll find nothing more impactful, inspiring and downright
Speaker 1: entertaining out there. Thank you for coming along in this
Speaker 1: journey today with us. Join me on the next episode
Speaker 1: of Lumsomeone with Delilah