One Year Later.

I don't think anything has affected my distanced existence more than Nick's death a year ago today. That "year ago" is an estimate. Nobody knows. He was found July 10 in his car "four to five days" after he died.

Nick's death dropped me to my knees, literally. Nothing does that to me anymore... not China, no being fired from teaching, not breakups... just Nick. Richard's suicide two months later was a punch in the gut reinforcing Nick's absence, but the tears shed then were more for Nick - no disrespect for the brilliant mind and heart of Richard.

Chances are you didn't know Nick. Few did. Nick kind of hid in his room for the two years we lived together. Before then, only Christine and a handful of others knew who he was. He kept to himself.

I'll spare you all the details of how he and I knew each other, just know that he holds a special place in my soul now and did when he was alive. If there were ever a "soulmate" version of a friend, it was Nick. I know the feeling was mutual. He didn't come out with me friends and I much, but the nights we spent on the roof talking life, girls, family... I miss it more than anything right now.

Nick was too kind. He wasn't of or for out world. To everyone else, he wouldn't stand up for himself. To me, he wouldn't play the game... he knew right from wrong on a very intimate level. He knew where he stood in our world. He knew he wasn't shit to a boss. He knew the world saw him as one more bag boy, one more stocker, one more person who could be told what to do if thrown a buck to pay the bills.

Nick knew this... he was too intelligent not too. It killed him inside when he was alive.

He made a stand a year ago. He decided to break rather than bend to the societal pressures commodifying his being into worthlessness.

Nick knew his options: work some shit job he hated, be homeless again, or check out. He had too much pride for the first two. I support him. That's what friends do. He knew what he was doing. No one has any right making judgment unless they walked a mile in his shoes.




"You've got the harder part,
I've got the easy part,
I've got the harder heart."
- Isaac Brock.