A journey of loss, love and discovery

Jimmy Gauntt—personable, brilliant Jimmy—died at age twenty-four, struck by an automobile. The promising young writer’s death shattered his father Casey’s heart. Not since his own father’s sudden passing thirty-eight years before had Casey felt so much pain.  The loss of the two most important men in his life nearly shattered Casey’s mind.

Then the miraculous happened.

Through seeming coincidence and moments of magical synchronicity, Jimmy and Casey’s father make themselves known to Casey, his family and Jimmy’s friends, sparking an amazing healing process that leads Casey—a conservative businessman—into the mystical world of mediums, shamans, coffee readers, and spirit guides. The volume and velocity of these contacts from the other side eventually lead Casey to a remarkable conclusion: his relationships with his father and son never ended. Even death cannot separate us from our loved ones.

Casey journaled these amazing revelations as they began to unfold in late 2008 and shared them with family and close friends.  By 2011 there were so many stories, and so many others who could benefit from this knowledge, Casey started this website and borrowed its title from the last words spoken by Jimmy to one of his best friends, Erik Shepner: “Hey Shep, Write Me Something Beautiful.  Write me something beautiful and send it to me.”

In 2015 Casey pulled the core stories into a book co-authored with his son, Jimmy.  Suffering Is the Only Honest Work shares its title with the poem Jimmy wrote after he ran-and finished-the 2007 Los Angeles Marathon.

Write Me Something Beautiful and Suffering Is the Only Honest Work

May change everything you think you know about life, death, and the boundary that separates the two.

For anyone who has ever lost a loved one, Casey and Jimmy offer the greatest gift of all: the awareness we never really lose the ones we love.  We can still find them, and they can find us.

Author Bios

Write Me Something Beautiful Authors - Casey and Jimmy Gauntt

Casey Gauntt

is a retired attorney and former senior executive of a major San Diego real estate company. He lives in Solana Beach, California, with his wife, Hilary. Casey grew up in Itasca, Illinois, graduated Lake Park High School in 1968, and received B.S., JD and MBA degrees from the University of Southern California.

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Jimmy Gauntt

was born and raised in Solana Beach and graduated from Torrey Pines High School in 2002.   A prestigious Trustee Scholar at the University of Southern California, he majored in English and Spanish. He authored six plays, five screenplays, and a multitude of poems and short stories. Beginning in 2010, the USC English Department annually bestows the Jimmy Gauntt Memorial Award—aka “The Jimmy”—to the top graduates in English.  Jimmy passed over to the other side in 2008 at age 24.

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