Jacob Schlosser, 12, gets made up in Make-A-Wish swag as his mother, Sarah Schlosser, takes photos of him and their new RV on Saturday, June 25, 2011, at Sonny's RVs in Evansville, Wyo. Schlosser, who suffers from hypoplastic left heart syndrome, asked for an RV as his Make-A-Wish request. (AP Photo/Casper Star-Tribune, Dan Cepeda)
He could have gone to Hawaii. Or maybe visited a dude ranch. But those didn’t hold his interest. Most children his age might have wanted to visit Disney World. Maybe he did, too, but his heart condition wouldn’t have allowed him to enjoy the rides there.
So shy, 12-year-old Jacob Schlosser, who lives in Wyoming and has reached that part of a boy’s life when the great outdoors holds limitless potential, wished for a travel trailer.
Saturday afternoon, he got one.
He took it in sheepishly, onlookers huddled around as he did. Then he walked back over to his mother, who brought him, and hugged her.
“What do you think?” Sarah Schlosser asked her son. “Are you speechless? That’s unlike you.”
that said it all.
Jacob Schlosser was diagnosed with hypoplastic left heart syndrome moments after he was born. Simply put, it is a potentially fatal condition that occurs when parts of the left side of the heart do not develop. There is no known cause.
The condition has led to Schlosser having three heart surgeries. He had a check-up roughly two months ago. He got a good report, and is doing as well as can be expected, his mother said.
“He fatigues faster than other kids his age,” she said when asked how the condition affects him.
When he was younger, his mother had a chance to get him involved in the Make-A-Wish Foundation of Wyoming. But if she was to ever do that, she said, she wanted him to be old enough to make his own wish. So she waited.
About a year and a half ago, she got the ball rolling and Jacob Schlosser, who enjoys camping, horseback riding and 4-H Clubs, settled on a travel trailer.
Dana Wirtz, wish coordinator for the local foundation, said the Wyoming chapter usually makes about 30 wishes come true each year for children suffering from life-threatening conditions.
Wirtz said trips are popular, Disney World is popular and sometimes computers are popular.
“A wish for a thing, or a trailer, is pretty rare,” she said.
But that is what Schlosser wished for and the foundation coupled with Sonny’s RV in Evansville to make it happen Saturday.
Jacob’s new RV is about 20-feet long, with a refrigerator, a kitchen and a bathroom inside. Ownership at the business pitched in and by the time Schlosser showed up and saw his wish, it was surrounded by camping supplies: packages of graham crackers, fishing tackle, an air raft, marshmallows, life vests, chocolate bars, sleeping bags, a fishing pole and sunscreen.
Asked what he thought of the spread after he walked into Sonny’s, Schlosser, who is in the sixth grade and was dressed in shorts and high-top tennis shoes, said, “I’m speechless.”
He knew it was coming. Excitement kept him awake most of Friday night. He lives in Lander with his family and, after his sleepless night, slept during most of the ride to Casper on Saturday.
He and his mother have already planned their first outing in their new travel trailer: The Fremont County Fair and Rodeo late next month.
At one point Saturday, after Schlosser had been presented with a key to the travel trailer, he walked back over and hugged his mother. In that moment, when Sarah Schlosser was asked what she thought about it, she looked at her quiet, smiling son and said, “I’m happy for him.”
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