Heartbreakingly Beautiful: In 2013 I attended a memorial for a young man who took his own life.
I arrived alone to a room full of people I didn’t know and slid quietly to the back of the crowd.
Most people in the room were a few years younger than me, artsy & musician types.
I felt out of place not having known him for long or all that closely.
On the wall there was a screen with projected images of of his life, childhood, smiling friends…
Several of the musicians played & sang it was beautiful and painfully sad. People were encouraged to get up and share memories, stories and feelings. Several did, some were funny, some angry, some attempting to understand or reason or come to peace with such a loss the best way they could, under it all was a deep sadness. Many started by saying “I didn’t know him well…”
Had I got up I would have likely stared the same way and would have liked to have said what’s below.
The 1st time we met is the one I remember the most, I was coming down a flight of stairs at last years Pride as he was going up, he smiled at me & it was an amazing/increadible smile, it was so genuine & nice that it confused me. I was stuck pondering it for the next few minutes to see if there was some mocking subtext or if I had something on my face, I’m not accustomed to strangers smiling like that. That was the entirety of the 1st time we met, it was roughly 5 seconds.
Some months later I noticed through facebook that he was attending a meeting of a group I took part in, this was our first introduction. He was very chatty, social & charming, thought that may simply have been his Irish accent & the way he pronounced his name & then repeated it with the Americanized pronunciation.
The next time I bumped into him was at the Halloween performance of Rocky Horror. He was in the play & played Rocky, wearing nothing but a pair of skin tight gold shorts & sneakers. I was dressed up for the show and looked nothing like myself. As I came out of the bathroom I saw him standing back to me, I slid next to him & said “I desperately wanted to pinch your bum” he and his circle of actors laughed and I then told him who I was. I returned to my seat. I wish I had pinched…
The last time we spoke was after an auction for AIDS Saint John, he had asked me to donate some photography & for me to contact any other artists in the city I might know who would do likewise. After the auction as I left I waved to him, not wanting to intrude because he was talking to a woman. He turned, we shook hands & he thanked me for helping out. I saw him once more after that, walking with his girlfriend up princess street, I waived & drove by.
On the 25th of June his photo was circulated about facebook stating that he was missing & that if anyone sees him there was contact info. I skipped work early that day & decided to roam around the lower part of the city taking pictures & halfheartedly hoped perhaps I would catch a glimpse of him. I had a meeting that night & as I arrived was told that he had been found.
I took this photo on that day. I decided to included it in the collection they did of writings & memories that they are going to bind into a small book for his girlfriend.
Seeing those heartbroken strangers who barely knew him and his closest friends in agony was terrible I only felt a fraction of their pain and it’s something I hope never to have to go through again. If you are suffering from depression please get help, if you know someone who is suffering don’t let them suffer alone be an asshole make them get help.
XxxooO
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