I just got news that one of my best oldest friends took his own life.
I grew up surfing with him and he was one of two friends I have that go all the way back to when I first started surfing. He was in sixth or seventh grade and I was a freshman in high school. It was 1975. I made him a couple surfboards back then.
I have this feeling like a part of me died. All those times we shared. Years and years. We could spend hours talking story…rides, sessions, people, antics…now they will be buried within me because no one who was there and shared them is around…
At the same time of year last year, I lost my father. Although we rarely spoke of “things that matter” together, the few times we did made them all the more important. I thought, just like you, that a part of me had disappeared the day he died, but, one year later, I find that I’m talking with him pretty much all the time, as if he were still there. Know what I mean? Asking for his opinion or an advice when I start doing something new. I think that we communicate even more than when he was still alive. In fact, I tend to believe that he’s more alive than I am…
You are in shock right now and that’s what everybody feels like when loosing a beloved one. Just give time to time.