Blood may be thicker than water. It’s the fluid of life, an essential force providing a constant flow of resources and creating energy.
For Jesse Thiele, son of Jim and Leenda, the constant flow slowed to a trickle on a fateful September day in 2016.
Thiele, then a fifth-grade student, was at home in Clearwater on Sept. 29, working on a math worksheet, alongside older brothers Eli and Alex.
Alex and Jesse took a break, which turned into a wrestling match.
“I still had a pencil in my hand,” Jesse said.
The wrestling match progressed toward the wall.
“The pencil (tip) was facing me,” he added.
Alex assumed his younger sibling was holding the writing utensil in his armpit.
Instead, the wood and lead entered Jesse’s body just above the collar bone, severing the jugular vein and pushing through a lung before cutting through another artery.
The boys removed the pencil.
Unlike a scene from a movie, where blood would spurt everywhere, there was no visible sign the young Thiele would be wrestling with a life-and-death situation. A few drops of blood bled into his shirt.
“There was just a ton of internal bleeding,” Jesse said. He immediately knew something was off and ran to the kitchen, seeking assistance from his mom, Leenda.
He remembers asking for help.
Then, he landed on the floor.
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