This piece is part of Mashable Spotlight, which presents in-depth looks at the people, concepts and issues shaping our digital world.

Unshaven for weeks, Brandon Curtis's bearded face gazes back at him from the iPad screen. He's in Los Angeles Skyping with his dad, who lies weakened from lung cancer and Parkinson's disease in a hospice bed 1,450 miles away in rural Nebraska.

"What if this is our goodbye?" Brandon wonders to himself before capturing several screenshots of the conversation with 63-year-old Brian Curtis.

It's 11:12 a.m. on Aug. 12, two days before Brandon turns 30, and he is waiting for the first available flight to Nebraska. All previous Skype calls now seem trivial to him. Brian has only hours to live, but his son's flight won't land until midnight.

"There were tears, not wanting to miss holding him one more time," Brandon recalls.

Throughout the five-minute Skype call, Brian lies in bed. He's surrounded by shades of blue and pink, emanating from wall-mounted photos, paintings, messages and cards. Strangers from more than 100 distant countries sent the images via social media or snail mail to comfort a man they'd never meet. Brian calls the color combination "sky blue pink."

Both voices on the call pause at one point in the conversation.

"We just looked at each other for quite some time without any words," Brandon says.

I'm on my way, Brandon tells his dad, unsure if he'll make it in time to bid farewell.

From a Grim Call, #SkyBluePink Is Born

Fifteen months earlier, an emotional call sideswipes Brandon. Dad has terminal lung cancer, he learns during a business trip in Austria on April 24, 2012. Brandon swiftly puts his duties as Red Bull's international digital brand manager on hold to fly home and be beside his father, who is processing the news in Nebraska.

Dad defeats Brandon in a game of checkers within 24 hours of his son's arrival. In between discussions of cancer, father and son bond — this time, urgently. On day two, they talk about "dude stuff" and drink beers together for the first time, stopping briefly to take an outdoor Instagram selfie with their canned Miller Lites.

Brian has six months to live — "plus or minus three months" — doctors inform the Curtis family. Brian chooses to forgo chemotherapy to avoid compounding the pain brought on by his pre-existing Parkinson's disease.

Losing another immediate family member weighs heavily on Brandon's mind.

"My oldest sister, Jana, had passed away unexpectedly from an undetected heart virus just eight months prior — none of us had the chance to say goodbye," Brandon says. "So when we found out about my dad's terminal cancer, we were going to do anything it took to show him how much we loved him and to say goodbye."

Brandon and family decide to launch #SkyBluePink, an online campaign they hope will bring happiness to their patriarch and keep family members connected during Brian's final days. "Sky blue pink" is Brian's favorite color — one not found in crayon boxes, but rather, witnessed in beautiful sunsets and sunrises.

"We ask you to help fill his life with love, support and #SkyBluePink" by sending a card, tweeting a note on Twitter or sharing a photo on Instagram, reads the project's announcement, which Brandon shares on Imgur.

A Happy Surprise

Brandon waits a week after starting #SkyBluePink to tell Brian that strangers are thinking about him. The Curtis family has received 500 or so submissions in just 168 hours. "It was enough to cover an entire wall at his hospice care center," says Brandon.

May 7 is the big reveal. Brandon and his older sister Cindy sit next to their dad. Brandon reads messages on two entries — one from Germany, the next from Australia.

"It's making my dad cry with pride and disbelief," Brandon recalls. "This is incredible."

The success of #SkyBluePink is a striking reminder — despite some dissent that technology and social media are making people less personal and ultimately more alone than ever — that people still care, that social platforms have the potential to bring the world together, one retweet, Like, comment, share and favorite at a time.

Friends and family spread the project across their social channels that first week. One friend tweets, "Would you help make him smile?" Another eagerly writes, "#skybluepink is the hottest new color — spread the word."

Meanwhile, Brandon wrestles with the idea of requesting an extended amount of time off work, "but because we really didn't know when his health would decline further, he wanted me to keep working and just visit when I could," he says.

I need you to keep living your life, Brian tells his hesitant son, knowing #SkyBluePink would allow the two to feel constantly connected.

"If I couldn't always be there, I needed a way for him to feel loved," Brandon says.

'The West On Fire, Sky Blue Pink'

It's May 15, two weeks after the diagnosis. Nebraska band Good Show Great Show posts a message on its blog, detailing Brian's story alongside a blunt message: "Cancer sucks."

The blog debuts a new song, fittingly titled "Sky Blue Pink" (listen, below).

Have you heard what I've heard?

Ain't never gonna find another love like yours.



Have you seen what I've seen?

The West on fire, sky blue pink



Have you drank the river's water deep?

Big Blue cuttin on my apple tree



Do you know what I know?

This body it won't let me go

It don't matter what they think

The West on fire, sky blue pink



Cindy finds the song and plays it multiple times for Brian, then thanks the bandmates (friends of Brandon) in a message on the blog: "First a huge smile spread across his face, then he cried. We like your whiskey-flavored music! The overall sound, the lyrics — everything about this song — is so perfect for my Dad."

Brandon, at a loss for words, describes the song simply as "insanely amazing." It serves as a tribute to the life Brian has lived so far. Brandon shares his own fond memories of his father: The first time they golfed. The truck rides home from middle school. The time he watched dad disassemble a lawn mower, explain every part and reassemble it.

He's the father Brandon wishes "all kids were lucky enough to have." Born at the onset of the 1950s, Brian grew up in small-town Iowa before earning a degree in vocational agriculture at Iowa State University in 1972, then working in various capacities in that industry until he retired in Nebraska in early 1992 when his Parkinson's accelerated.

Brian learned about the "sky blue pink" color from his mom, Marie Spillman Curtis, who used it to describe the sun's daily rise and fall at dawn and dusk.

#SkyBluePink connects three generations now, not to mention thousands of strangers who have joined the journey to help the Curtis family get through this rough patch.

More months pass. Brian undergoes radiation to pare tumors that have spread through his ribs, shoulders, lymph nodes, lungs and spine. But by Christmas, the family counts nearly 2,700 #SkyBluePink submissions.

Brian sees them all every time he wakes up and before he falls asleep. Love is medicine — I like this more than all these pills, Brandon remembers his father saying.

Brian requests Brandon share this message online:

"It's just amazing. I can’t get over how so many people have taken time out of their days to capture and send SkyBluePink to me. From all over. All ages ... People I've never met."

An Outfit Untouched

A dark grey suit. A skinny black tie. A pair of black dress shoes. A black button down shirt with white pinstripes, white buttons and red stitching. Brandon packs these items into a suitcase.

"Since I didn't know when the inevitable call would come to travel home, I had been carrying a suit, tie and dress shirt wherever I would go," Brandon says of the outfit he pre-picked to wear at Brian's impending memorial service.

Brandon travels constantly in the United States and overseas for business.

"It was a difficult reality to always have that reminder that my dad's life had a time limit," he adds. "You never really think about that, for anyone."

The call comes from Cindy on Aug. 12. She's calm, but her voice is shaky. Cindy connects Brandon to dad on Skype. Brian has a hard time speaking.

"I told him I loved him so much. I told him he was a great father — that I looked up to him, that he didn't need to worry about me because he had done a really good job setting me up for success in life and that I was on my way to see him."

Hours pass. Brian mistakenly thinks a hospice worker is Brandon. "Dad is excited to see u," Cindy writes in a Facebook message to Brandon. "When the nurse walked in he thought it was u and he tried to sit up."

Rushing to See Brian One Last Time

Brandon arrives at the Lincoln airport close to midnight, ready for the hour and a half drive to Harvard, a modest midwestern town of fewer than 1,000 people. Brian is "holding strong," reports Cindy via text. He hops into a silver Honda truck driven by longtime friend Trevor Meyer. Together, they speed west along Interstate 80 for 60 miles, then south on Nebraska Highway 14.

Around 1:30 a.m., Brandon walks into his dad's dark room at Harvard Rest Haven. Brian is sitting up in bed with Cindy holding his hand. A bathroom light dimly illuminates the hospice bedroom. On every wall, on the door and in two binders, more than 3,500 #SkyBluePink cards, paintings, photos and even elementary school art projects from 105 countries surround the family.

"I sat next to him," Brandon recalls. It's his 16th visit to the bedside in 15 months. "I held his hands. I started crying. It felt so good to see him. I'll never forget that night."

As they talk, Brian is feeling an "intense" amount of pain. Brandon's in the same red t-shirt and jeans he wore during the Skype call some 14 hours ago, but he's relieved he could be here this moment.

Brandon and Cindy let him sleep, and Brian passes away hours later on Aug. 13, just one day before Brandon's 30th birthday.

"Though we'd only been in one room the whole time," he says, "I felt like the three of us had just traveled on the most intense journey of our lives, transcending the room."

Brandon opens Facebook later in the day to bear the news and offer thanks to the #SkyBluePink community.

'Sky Blue Pink Will Always Mean Love'

Brandon trims his beard for the Sept. 14 memorial service, taming it to a tidy one-week length, just the way his mother likes it. As planned, he wears the suit, tie and dress shirt he's had ready for months to the service in Brian's home state of Iowa.

At the memorial, Cindy recalls stories about Brian. Brandon shares #SkyBluePink.

"I really think [#SkyBluePink] did play a role in him beating the doctor's expectations," Brandon says. "'Sky Blue Pink' will always mean love."

They play Good Show Great Show's "Sky Blue Pink" song during the service.

Do you know what I know?

This body it won't let me go

It don't matter what they think

The West on fire, sky blue pink

Everyone there knows the song. They're familiar with the thousands of #SkyBluePink submissions. They're all part of this crowdsourced project of love. It's the kind of online outpouring of emotion, intentional or happenstance, that's exemplified on Reddit, on Kickstarter, on Facebook and across social platforms on any given day.

"It may sound silly, but with media and politics often telling us we're all so different, it was a great reminder — that despite any real or contrived differences — we're all people and we actually have a lot in common," Brandon says. "We all have feelings, emotion and compassion. #SkyBluePink was just one way to unlock this.

"People are incredible."

Featured image: Mashable, Bob Al-Greene; other images: Brandon Curtis