I keep this picture underneath the clear, plastic cover of my work planner.
It’s Kip and me on the day we graduated from high school. It’s not at all the best picture in the world. The flash washed us out. There’s a gleaming exit sign in the background. The date is digitally stamped in the corner in neon orange numbers. The picture’s edges are worn from being transferring to a new planner each year. I love it, anyway. I knew that Kip and I probably wouldn’t see each other after the ceremony with the crush of family and friends, so I made sure to pass off my old film camera to a friend while we were waiting in the gymnasium. It is, sadly, the most recent picture I have of us together.
In a weird way, I’m somewhat grateful that the anniversary of his death falls around my birthday, and that his birthday is right before Christmas. I don’t have an excuse to forget, because in the anticipation of those occasions, there’s a heavy knowledge they are not only times for celebration; families have remembrance and grief, too. So I write what feels like an inadequate “thinking of you” card, and I send it to Kip’s parents and brother. I look at this old picture that was taken before we parted ways for school and dreams.
It has been five years since I got the news, and I still can’t believe it.
11 comments
Thanks for sharing this picture, as well as the links to past posts about your friend Kip. I can’t imagine what that must’ve been like. Sending hugs from Seattle.
Those high school memories feel like they’re harder to hold on to, somehow. It’s so nice that you always keep this memory close.
Do you think you’ll ever believe it? I ask because it’s now been over 2 years since I got news about a friend of mine dying and I still can’t believe it. I kinda wish I could believe it so I would stop with that obnoxious tiny glimmer of hope that I will run into him at X event only to remember that no, I won’t see him, and then I have to be crushed by the realization all over again. It would be nice to know that at some point this denial will finally go away.
Thanks for sharing that picture. And I bet those cards you send to Kip’s family every year are far more adequate than you know.
I recognized him immediately. Gosh, he was a ton taller than you. You know, in a way, you are continuing your friendship with Kip by sending those cards to his parents and brother. It really honors his memory. I’m glad you do it.
This is such a sweet post, and the tribute to him last year as well. Thank you for sharing this.
xox
This was a great post! Thanks for sharing.
He looks so much like a friend of mine, it’s eerie. I’m so sorry for the loss of your friend, and I know it must mean so much to his family that you continue to remember him and them.
I’m sending lots of hugs to you on this day. I know it’s a really hard anniversary. I hope someone buys you a donut.
That is just so hard. Thank you for sharing this with us. I know it wasn’t easy to write.
Thanks for sharing, I’m sure it couldn’t have been easy to. I’m sure those card’s you send to Kip’s family are a reminder of how much he was loved!
It’s so wonderful that you send cards to his family. When I think of tragedies like this, I think the hardest part would be that the rest of the world eventually moves on and forgets. While there’s nothing you can say that feels right in a card like that, just sending one takes more balls than most people have.
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