The death of a friend is devastating, but for former Gilroy resident Danielle Rhinehart, experiencing such a loss in her senior year of high school was life-altering
It happened in October 1999. Karen Tyson, a dear friend of Rhinehart’s, had graduated the year before from Gilroy High School, where they had met. The day before Tyson’s 19th birthday, she passed away from bacterial meningitis.
The loss was too much for Rhinehart.
“I think I kind of had this conversation with God after she died,” Rhinehart says. “I thought we agreed you wouldn’t do things like this,” she had said to Him.
Headlong into applying to colleges, Tyson’s death drastically affected Rhinehart’s priorities.
“I think what I got from it most was that life is fleeting, and you don’t know how much time you have,” she says.
This realization motivated her to throw away the applications to colleges away from home, family and friends. She chose, instead, to attend Gavilan College—her proximity to those she cared for far outweighing her educational goals.
The years leading up to this decision also contributed to her feelings of loss, abandonment and low self-esteem. It began in kindergarten when Rhinehart was diagnosed with a specific type of numeric dyslexia, called dyscalculia. At the same time, another discovery was made; Rhinehart tested as a gifted student.
“People always told me I was really smart. I don’t know that I ever believed it,” Rhinehart says.
“I think it’s interesting for a kid to be given those messages, to be told you could skip a grade, but we’re not going to let you, you could go to the fancy smart kids school, but we’re not going to send you.”
For Rhinehart, it was a confusing way to grow up, her identity always an uncertainty. Then in her first year at South Valley Middle School, she faced a trauma many children experience today: her parents decided to divorce.
“It was a really rough time for me because that was when my parents were splitting up, and it was a really ugly divorce,” Rhinehart says, adding, “I didn’t do well in school in eighth grade, I really kind of tanked.”
After high school Rhinehart attended Gavilan and worked a number of part-time jobs around town. Eventually she moved to San Jose, which resulted in her course load at Gavilan dwindling down to one or two classes a semester. She took classes at De Anza College, as well as at the University of Phoenix, which she now admits was a waste of money.
“I felt like I wasn’t doing enough, I wasn’t living enough,” she says.
Rhinehart spent the next several years living in San Jose while working in Sunnyvale. But with the loss of her full-time receptionist position, followed by being laid off from a property manager position—which provided her a rent-free apartment—Rhinehart found herself without a job and a place to live.
It was during this time that Rhinehart discovered the book Eat, Pray, Love, by Elizabeth Gilbert. She’d never really taken the time to read the book before now, and the message she took away from it—to find yourself and pursue what’s important to you—motivated her.
Rhinehart decided to return to her childhood home. She also returned to Gavilan and completed her Associate’s degree by acing not one, but two math classes that she’d previously failed, quite a feat considering her dyscalculia.
“I was so proud of myself, it was this moment of, ‘I can actually do this,’” Rhinehart says.
Spurred on by her accomplishment, Rhinehart felt she’d found the path she’d been searching for and decided to continue her education. She applied to numerous four-year colleges, including San Francisco State University, where she was accepted.
Commuting to San Francisco from Gilroy would be a struggle, but Rhinehart was determined. As it turned out, she didn’t have to.
She heard that a good friend of hers, Sam Wardell, whom she’d known since grade school, had moved to San Francisco, so Rhinehart reached out to him.
“I had always thought of him as such a good-hearted person, he was just such a solid and genuine person, always,” Rhinehart says.
The two met up for coffee. Coffee turned into lunch. Lunch turned into three hours of talking in the park. During this meeting Wardell convinced Rhinehart that she could afford to live in the city and grabbed a napkin and started calculating her budget to show her just how she could accomplish this.
Rhinehart still has that napkin.
In June 2015 she found a post on Elizabeth Gilbert’s Facebook page, which she’d been following since reading the book almost 10 years ago. The author was holding an essay contest, requesting submissions from her readers detailing how the book influenced their lives.
Rhinehart submitted her entry just before the July deadline.
“It was definitely pinned in my mind as one of these things that I’d be stupid not to do,” Rhinehart says.
Especially when you consider that the contest announcement coincided with Rhinehart’s graduation from San Francisco State with a Master’s degree in Communications Studies.
“I thought back and went, ‘you lit the match. You sparked all of this with this book, lady.’”
Three months later, Rhinehart received an email from Riverhead Books announcing that she’d been selected for the anthology. Wardell was the first person she called to share her good news.
“It was exciting, it was pretty cool,” Wardell says.
In April, the 10th anniversary of Eat, Pray, Love’s, original release, Eat, Pray, Love, Made Me Do It: Life Journeys Inspired by the Bestselling Memoir, containing Rhinehart’s essay, was released.
Rhinehart is proud of her essay, proud of her educational achievements, and proud of her life, feeling that she’s successfully followed in the footsteps of her mentor, Elizabeth Gilbert.
She “ate up the city,” during her time at SF State. Her prayers were in the form of her devotion to her studies, making herself better, more knowledgeable, and to her love—Wardell.
“Sam’s this very safe, strong, positive influence,” Rhinehart says.
The couple live and works in San Francisco. They’re planning a fall wedding and Rhinehart is now considering stepping away from the executive assistant position that she’s held for the past two years and getting back into education.
“After all of this, I realize that I really do love to teach and watch people’s minds open up,” Rhinehart says.
With all she’s learned throughout her struggles, as well as the guidance she received from the book, Rhinehart’s future is now filled with hope and happiness, which echoes a statement in her essay.
“Elizabeth Gilbert taught me how to devour joy, become devoted to myself, and fall in love with growth.”
Danielle Rhinehart is doing all these things, and doing them well.
