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Yesterday about an hour before I left for work a friend called to tell me that a mutual friend of ours had died that morning.
I hadn't even known he was sick. Over the last month, he had progressed from a stomach illness to a severe lung infection and was put on the transplant list, but didn't get a new lung in time.
We didn't have the closest friendship, not lately anyway. A year ago we were tight, very close friends, but over the year we drifted apart, which was more my fault than his. My other friends found him annoying, and I started to believe them and find him annoying as well. Friday night, the night before he died, we were making jokes about him. The next morning he died.
I can barely comprehend everything I'm feeling. Guilt, sadness, shame, sorrow. I should have hung out with him more. We used to play RISK for hours on end, you'd think we went to school at the Army War College we played that game so much.
I can't believe he is gone. He was 19, only a year younger than I am. A year YOUNGER than I am. He should not have been on the list of people in this world that died young. He tried hard to get everything out of life that he could, but in the end life failed him.
Anyone who believes in anything worth praying to, I would appreciate your prayers for Rob. I hope wherever he is right now, he's playing Everquest and eating thick burgers from Hardees. Both things he talked about unendingly.
I've lost family before, but never a friend, even one who I've drifted away from for some time. I can't imagine how much this would hurt if it were a close friend.
Also, anyone on here who hasn't already, and doesn't have religious objection, I'm begging you to become an organ donor. No one should have to die waiting for a new lung, or whatever. Please, if you are willing, take the time to register, or fill out an organ donor card, whatever you have to do in your area. Please.
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Lyrhawn, my best friend died when she was 21. It sucked. It hurt. It was terrible. I feel for you.
Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
This happened twice in my high school, once to one of my closest friends and a second time to someone I hadn't been close to. It never gets easier. You have my sympathies.
I, too, am a registered organ donor.
Posts: 10886 | Registered: Feb 2000
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I've been an organ donor since I was 18, and requested that my parents donate my organs if I was ever in an accident or anything at the tender age of 12.
I know that probably doesn't make you feel better. (((hugs)))
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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You know that every one of these threads cuts a chunk out of my heart.
I could mutter along for three Hatrack pages about death; but that would be useless, and it'll be redundant.
I think that a *hug* is enough to show you what I prefer to do out of virtuality. And a hug passes on more than words could possibly say, even at Hatrack level.
(((Lyrhawn))), and if only this were not electronic.
I've said too much already. I'm shutting up. JH
Posts: 2978 | Registered: Oct 2004
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Thanks guys. I appreciate it, and I'm glad to see that so many of you are already organ donors.
I spent most of today with mutual friends just talking about him, and we're all feeling better, and sadder. It's a strange feeling.
I just never expected to have to deal with the loss of a friend so early in life. We're young, we're supposed to be invincible.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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A poem I think is appropriate (it always makes me cry):
Poem by Langston Hughes
I loved my friend. He went away from me. There's nothing more to say. The poem ends Soft as it began- I loved my friend.
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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(((L))) I'm sorry.....I really don't know what to say. If this had happened to me, oh my gosh....I don't know what I would do. Hang in there.
Edit: I probably wouldn't have said, "Hang in there," if I had noticed it was in the post right before mine. Either way, stay strong.
Posts: 6026 | Registered: Dec 2004
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