It was impossible to attend Irving High School in the early 1980s and not absorb life lessons from the personal tragedy that engulfed Ray Cerda Jr. — even from a seat in the peanut gallery of his social theater, which is where I spent my high school years.
If ever a kid appeared to have it all — class president and football team quarterback — Ray was the kind of guy you felt almost obligated to like, no matter what your role in the high school pageant. He was personable, handsome, kind, focused and grounded. The sort of kid who smiled at freshmen, modeled good classroom behavior and gave himself over with genuine enthusiasm to whatever task he picked up. These are the traits that would ultimately serve him when so much else was yanked away.
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Life changed drastically and forever for Ray in May 1981 when he was ejected through the sunroof of a pickup in a late-night accident on Highway 114. He was wearing no seat belt when he nodded off as a passenger in his friend’s truck. He awoke to a nightmare of immobility and terror at St. Paul Hospital, a quadriplegic unable to wipe away his own tears. He was 16 years old.
Though we were never friends, I've thought of Ray often through the years and wondered how he got along. I wonder no more. In his recently self-published book, The Life I Didn't Expect: Facing Adversity and Winning, Ray details his road back to life, from the night of his accident through his rise to director of Parks and Recreation for the city of Irving.
It is a raw and highly personal account in the beginning, detailing the gruesome realities of his rehabilitation and the emotional toll on his family. He also writes at great length about how the community rallied to his aid — and honestly it is as heartwarming to read now as it was to watch it unfold in real time.
As the cause célèbre of the Class of ’82, Ray’s high-profile injury couldn’t help but raise awareness of disabilities for all of us. Watching him push his wheelchair through the school, which was not even equipped with an elevator at the time, was life-altering for us, too, in the smallest of ways. No literature assignment, no civil rights essay could have offered us a better education in the capriciousness of life and its casual cruelties.
As it turned out, though, Ray was bigger than all of that. He graduated college and fought hard to launch a career, overcoming the doubts of his employers. He spent years improving various rec centers in Grand Prairie and Irving before ascending to the Irving directorship, celebrating with his family each rung on the ladder.
Ray retired from the city in 2018 and now commits his time to consulting. That this book is written to both put his story out there for the curious among us and to advance his role as a public speaker should not deter any reader grown weary of individuals exploiting tragedy for profit. Ray’s accident was unquestionably tragic — yet his life has been something else entirely.
This book is real, and worth your time — a readable story told simply and earnestly, heavy in content and well-crafted, especially for a first-time author. Ray is the real deal, too — a man who has forged through his own tremendous personal grit a series of achievements that should make anybody proud. Though he gives full credit to his family, his God and his community, it’s obvious Ray’s success came also from reaching deep within himself and demanding to live a life of merit with few limits on the personal standards he set for himself.
There are lessons in humanity for all of us here. For medical personnel, to never forget the frightened child inside your patient; for friends, to never forget the sting of isolation; for victims of tragedy to somehow — incredibly — find forgiveness; for employers, to look past a chair and see a man determined to stand on his own two feet, however metaphorically he may need to do it.
CORRECTED at 11:20 a.m. Oct. 10: This story has been updated to clarify that Ray Cerda Jr. was a high school quarterback, rather than team captain.
The Life I Didn't Expect: Facing Adversity and Winning
By Ray Cerda Jr.
(Amazon-Kindle Direct Publishing, 230 pages, $11.99)