Michael James Bradford 22nd July 1986 – 12th January 2001 Although Michael’s life was short in years he made up for it by the enormous impact he made on so many people. His warmth, sweat nature, his cheeky spirit and his amazing ability to make people laugh, Michael had such zest for life and he radiated joy into the lives of everyone who knew him. Michael still lives in every room of our home. The pictures of Michael, his belongings, his presence and our memories are all around us. I look out the window and I see the little boy playing with his friends. I see him playing football in the park. I see the water fights we had in the summer. The big snowman we built in the front garden. The laughter we shared, the squabbles we sometimes had and the little boy turning into a young man. There is a huge gapping wound in our family that will be there forever. How can we heal when Michael is missing? Every thing we do is tainted because we do so without our son, brother and uncle. We will never be able to replace this part of our lives because how can you replace something that was so treasured, unique and beautiful? Michael was real. Our love for him was real. His laughter was real. His cheekiness was real but tragically so is his death. On any ordinary day, lives can be turned upside down and destroyed and it only takes a second. We will never know what Michael would’ve made of this life but we know that whatever he wanted to do he would have succeeded because that was Michael. He loved life and grabbed it with both hands, he enjoyed nothing more than doing and trying out new things I can honestly say that not one second of Michael’s life was wasted. Michael had so many friends, the phone would constantly ring with friends calling to talk to him and his friends were always in our home. We didn’t realise until after Michael died just how much he was loved by so many people. We were sent hundreds of cards and letters and at his funeral there were almost 800 people, Michael’s death affected a whole community. We had Michael at home to rest before the funeral and from morning till night there was a constant flow of people coming to say their goodbyes to him. We have 3 Memorial Books and the love on each page tells us how special he was and could still be if only the driver had STOPPED for the red light, not been SPEEDING and NOT DRIVEN whilst disqualified and un-insured. About a year after Michael died we started to understand that the laws regarding death and injury on the roads was like a 2nd class crime, the legal system didn’t seem to care. We not only had to grieve the death of our son but we also had to fight back against the legal system to get justice and any form of recognition that the actions of the driver caused Michael’s death, that is when I became involved with campaigning to change things and I became a member of BRAKE and RoadPeace. For the last 4 years I have worked along side Surrey Emergency Services speaking to 16-18 years olds at the Safe Drive Stay Alive Road Shows, in Dorking, to date we have spoken to 58,000 young people. I’ve also over the last 7 years tried to raise the public’s awareness to the needless loss of life and serious injuries that happen everyday one our roads, I’ve done this by doing T.V. and National Press interviews. I’ve gone and spoke to youth offenders and also year 11 in schools. This is the only way I can cope, I cannot let Michael’s death make me a victim, he certainly wouldn’t want that so I decided to become a survivor and whatever I do to try to stop other families having to go through what we have had to endure I do in memory of Michael, my son, my friend and the most precious gift I was blessed with. Our darling Michael we miss you more today than we did yesterday but not as much as we will miss you tomorrow Forever in our Hearts Mum, Dad and your Family XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX