thoughts of first impressions and football cleats

shared by Kyle Roman, her friend from high school

Our Freshman year in high school, before I met Cyn, all I heard from people was, “Cynthia Rabuy... blah, blah, blah...” I was like, “Who is this person and why is everyone talking about her like she was a queen?!” Finally, a couple weeks into the school year, Jeff Silva had borrowed my cleats for football practice and gave them to Cyn to give back to me. Now I had to go meet this queen in her Spanish class.

I hurried over a few minutes before class started, so as to not make a scene or interrupt. I saw a friend in there and asked where Cynthia Rabuy is. He pointed towards the front of the class and I approached. I said, "Hey, are you Cynthia?" She responded, "Oh, hi Kyle!” I felt as if I was a star because she had known who I was already.

She said nice to meet you and here are your cleats. This sweet, clean, cute and brilliant young lady, with her bare hands, handed over my dirty, smelly, muddy cleats!!! I knew from then on that this girl was a cut above the rest. She was different and better in many ways.

That was the moment that I met her, and I cherish that memory as reflective of the amazing person that she is to all of us. She is someone who I really value as a true friend and angel up above. There are so many memories with me and her that burn in my mind and that I can recall instantly.

Just as a general theme, I look back on conversations and have determined that she believed in me more than I did in myself back then. She was always seeking my opinion and approval on her thoughts, and was always telling me how smart I was. It was the first time someone other than my parents did that, and that was and is special to me going forward in my life.

Most of the time when people pass, we tend to embellish a lot of what they did. There is no way to embellish with Cyn. She was and is the brilliant, caring and beautiful person that we talk about. I still miss my friend very much. I am pouring tears as I write this. But they have turned to tears of joy because I have many memories to turn to.

thoughts of fruit snacks and granola bars

shared by VJ Rabuy, her sister

I recently enrolled in a class where my professor recommended a disaster relief kit for all our cars. The kit is simple enough, a radio with extra batteries, a flashlight, canned goods and a reliable can opener. Talk of this disaster kit made me think of the emergency food kits Cyn and I made when we were at Ardenwood Elementary School.

These emergency food kits were so fun because we got to get all the lunch snack items we grew to love, like granola bars and fruit snacks, and put all of them together in one pack. The best part was the day at the end of the school year when our teachers redistributed the kits and we got to eat all the goodies on our way home from the bus stop. Sometimes fun, yummy fruit snacks and the better-than-average granola bar bring back fond memories of those emergency food kits, and my Big Sis Cyn.