Back from Texas

The family and I were out in Texas for a week, more on that later.  As we were being dropped off at the airport (thanks, Mom!), I got a call from a friend.  I asked to call him back, but he said it was urgent.   A friend of ours had killed himself.  Stephen Akin.

Turns out, he didn't kill himself, though in some ways he precipitated his death by not taking care of himself.  It was a lot like my dad's death, in fact, a year ago in just a few days.  I am tempted to reflect on the parallels between their deaths, but why.  I already talked about it in a meeting.

So it was a melancholy vacation in some ways, with my phone ringing off the hook and buzzing from texts for a couple of days, and me reaching out to friends in different places so they wouldn't find out on Facebook.  Until I learned he hadn't killed himself, I lost sleep a couple of nights thinking about what he must have gone through leading up to his death, and even knowing he didn't quite kill himself, the basic situation isn't changed much.

He had a big laugh, a big smile, but is no more.  We played a lot of soccer together, backpacked through Europe together at the tender ages of 17 and 18, were in our first band together.  And yes, we drank a lot of beer together, and ate a lot of junk food too.

I will no doubt return to this over time, thought I have been returning to it all too much over the last week. Right now, I gotta go feed Graham lunch before granny comes to take him to get his new bike adjusted.