From Their Parents' Memories: Matt Miller and Gavin Powell

The deaths of Las Lomas juniors and best friends Matt Miller and Gavin Powell are breaking so many hearts right now.

They went missing during a along Walnut Creek on Saturday afternoon — a trip that was to be a President's Day weekend adventure. Hundreds of people joined authorities in the search for the two after they didn't return home. Their bodies were found Sunday along the waterway, about five miles north of where they set out near Murwood Elementary School. 

An  impromptu memorial sprang up on a small bridge over the creek. Gavin and Matthew apparently launched their raft beneath the bridge on Vanderslice Avenue, near Kayser Court.

The parents of both young men, despite being devastated by the worst pain a parent can suffer, took a few moments Monday to celebrate their boys' lives by talking to Walnut Creek Patch about all the ways they loved them, were proud of them and found them to be amazing human beings. 

"He could do anything," Bob Miller said about his 16-year-old son, Matt, whom he also called his best friend. Matt was a straight-A student and a gifted musician, athlete and artist. He could paint like American portrait artist John Singer Sargent and discuss politics, such as the transformative events in the Middle East, his dad said. 

He also was gifted in science and considered studying physics in college.  

"He was going to be a star," Miller said. "He was going to be great. I miss him so much." 

Matt and Gavin shared a love of the outdoors, running and hiking in the open space around Walnut Creek. According to Gavin's mother, Julie Powell, the two practically ran all the way up to the top of Mount Diablo.

Matt was in Boy Scouts when he was younger. Miller remembers the time he and his son, in one day, scaled 14,497-foot Mount Whitney, on the eastern side of the Sierra Nevada and the highest peak in the contiguous United States. After they reached the top of the peak, "Matt ran all the way down," Miller said. 

Parents of both boys said neither Matt nor Gavin hung with the "popular" crowd, but were well-liked and respected, including among adults, for their kind-hearted, easy-going demeanor.  "He would just talk to people and talk to adults," Miller said. "He spoke well."

Matt and his parents, Bob and Julie, and older sister Hannah, with whom he was very close, moved to Walnut Creek when Matt was 5. He attended and . Gavin attended  

It was at WCI that Matt and Gavin first got to know each other. Both were good math students.

Julie Powell spoke of her only child, Gavin, as being more quiet than his best friend. "He was very sensitive, even as a little kid." Other adults who knew Gavin have said — with fondness and admiration—that he was a little different, maybe a little more dreamy and philosophical. Powell agreed that her son was a bit "eccentric." 

"He definitely marched to his own drummer," another father said of Gavin, whom he called a smart, thoughtful young man—the kind of boy you wouldn't mind your daughter dating. 

Like Matt, Gavin was musically talented and studied piano. The two also shared an interest in world travel. While Matt traveled to various places around the world with his family and taught computer skills to residents of a small community in Nicaragua this past summer, Gavin studied Japanese at Las Lomas High and had developed a fascination with Asian culture. 

A few years ago, he had become a Buddhist and studied meditation at the Buddha Gate Monastery in Lafayette. Gavin, also a good student, planned to apply to a University of California campus. Beyond college, he wanted to travel, live overseas for a while, perhaps even join the Peace Corps. "He had lots of ambition," his mother said. 

But Gavin's career ambition didn't center on getting material things, his mother said. He was interested in environmental studies.

Terri Brohard, a neighbor of the Miller family, said many men in Walnut Creek, including Matt's former Scout leaders, are broken up by news of his death. 

She agreed that neither boy was in the "popular crowd," but in the "responsible" crowd, the crowd admired by staff, teachers and administrators. "Matt was the kind of kid you could talk to like an adult."

"He had an adult sensibility and an adult poise and candor," said Brohard,  who has two sons, 15 and 18. She and her family knew the Millers through the Indian Valley Swim Club. "He was a beautiful swimmer."

Their decision to go rafting in Walnut Creek on a rainy afternoon was a "blip" in lives that otherwise were sensible and responsible, Brohard said. 

Bob Miller said he knew something was wrong when he went to Gavin's house at 11 p.m. Saturday and neither boy was there. He and his wife tried calling and texting him. His failure to respond, so unlike Matt, prompted them to call police, who responded immediately and learned about the rafting trip.

Bob Miller expressed gratitude at the quick response of police and of the community, even as he mourns the loss of his son.

"I was so proud of him," he said.

A  candlelight walk organized by students will take place Wednesday evening in the Shell Ridge Open Space, where Matt and Gavin liked to hike.

 A memorial service for Matthew Miller will be at 2 p.m. Sunday at Congregation B'nai Tikvah, 25 Hillcroft Way, Walnut Creek.

Services for Gavin Powell are pending. 

Jonathan Hawthorne contributed to this report.