Two yeas ago today about four hours from now, I walked back to the office (the copy desk at the school newspaper) for a quick e-mail check between classes.
A minute after I sat down to read my messages, it was a fortunate thing that I was sitting down.
And about 15 seconds later, after I'd verified the news put out by two friends, it was going to be hard to walk again.
To pretend, as by walking, that anything was OK.
To not run the risk of momentary paralysis because at that instant, the news had hit in some harder, less controllable way,
that my friend Blake had been found dead in his hospital room earlier that day.
I use fake names for practically everybody I write about whom I know (or knew) rather than merely know of.
I'm using Blake's name because this is real and because I still struggle to believe and accept it.
I haven't see him in a little more than two years now. He went into the hospital when his chronic condition flared up.
My (newly minted -- 36 hours after Blake died, and 26 after I found out, we were actually physically literally in the process of getting married) wife and I attended his memorial service, for which extra chairs had to be brought in, and after they ran out of chairs, it was standing room only.
(You don't usually meet so many people at 19 who will drop everything at a moment's notice when you die.
He had. Vibrant does not fucking begin to describe this kid.)
I haven't seen him since before he was checked in to the hospital.
And I'm never going to be able to believe 100 percent -- because the only way for me to do it is basically impossible -- that he's gone.
And so if I don't do this, he leaves me in ways I won't stand or sit or breathe for.
Blake and I learned something together that many politically active and aware people are this year, and because of this president, starting to grasp for the first time, or maybe just anew.
Yeah, you can argue all day about issues you'll never agree on.
Or you can agree to disagree and move on.
Blake was as conservative and Christian as I was neither.
We realized that early.
So we moved on. I was tired of what I saw (and see) as intellectually vacant arguments, and he was more interested in "House, M.D." and "24."
(When Kos mentions "House" in a post, it is sort of a personal thrill for me because he thus unknowingly validates Blake.)
So we talked about "House" and football (he was the paper's sports editor, and I was a sports writer, though rarely for him) and baseball and college football and frankly anything else where people got paid to play games.
And we would tease each other about random shit, as people do (though you don't expect they'll be sort of mortal intellectual enemies on other battlefields).
A crucial school soccer game on production night was tied going into the second half.
And tied with five minutes left.
And tied in overtime.
And tied after penalty shots.
And tied after more.
I was laughing my ass off. Here the kid just wanted the bloody game to end so he could get the last facts into his story about it, and the teams just wouldn't let him do that.
Or I would drop something, and he'd say, as if my wrists were weakening, "Ooh, it's spreading," referring to my sexuality (he thought it was a choice, but he also didn't give a shit anymore because I wasn't about to come on to him) Or I would stumble on a word and he'd wonder if I was developing a lisp. Or one of us would miss an obvious mistake in a proof, and the other would say, "See, you've got to stop smoking so much crack, dude. It's not good for you."
One of the things that really annoyed him was corporate sponsorships in sports. So one day, on AIM, we spent like an hour thinking up the most ridiculous awards and game names.
The McDonald's Burger King Queen for a Day Midget Marathoner of the Year Award, Presented by Hyundai.
The George W. Bush Literacy Award. (He was a conservative, but he wasn't deaf.)
The Allstate Good Hands Play, Brought to you by Budweiser. (You kind of hard to be there.)
My favorite was how NASCAR drivers seemed to have their sponsors memorized, such that after they'd won the weekly race, the interview would start, "Boy, I can't say enough good things about our BudweiserArmyGoodyearNissanFred'sMotorsDairyQueenFirstMethodistChurchAllstateRubyTuesdayNikeMr.Goodb
ar sponsors ::collapses for lack of oxygen::."
He wondered at what point they would have to start wrapping sponsors' names around to the back of plaques (not NASCAR) because they'd run out of room on the front.
Ah, but kids, he's been dead two years, and where I couldn't stand him for things he did that I thought were colossally pointless ... I just don't care anymore.
I just care that after the Steelers won their sixth Super Bowl, his Facebook message didn't change.
He was my Steelers fan. (Steelers fans are ... you only need one in your life to know about everything that's going on with the team.)
And now, if he was right, he's got a seat at Art Rooney's table, and I am sat at my desk thinking back on a kid I knew for less than two years and realizing, only as I started writing this, how I came to the belief (the hope, really) that as long as people don't forget you, you don't die.
Because I still can't believe the kid's dead.
And unless I keep him alive, I'm going to have a hell of a time understanding how he can be dead and not dead.