In Loving Memory...

This is definitely not what I wanted to post about. But I have to do it.

So everyone knows that teen suicide is a huge problem. Although, it's a problem I find a lot of people ignore. Like if they pretend it's not real then maybe it'll go away. Like maybe it WON'T be real if they just close their eyes and think of unicorns.

Maybe I'm being a bit unfair. Of course people don't want to think morbid thoughts like that. If everyone else is anything like me, they want to live and love with a heart that's full and unbroken, untarnished by the world's discrepancies. So they pretend that things they don't like aren't there in the hopes they'll go away.

Well it didn't.

One of my close friends attempted suicide on Tuesday night by overdosing on pills. He died Wednesday night in intensive care. I knew he had depression, and I knew he was suicidal, but all I could think was "why him? Why didn't I see this coming?" And in a way I had. But he lives an hour away.

I would have sat with him and held his hand every night if it had kept him tethered to me just a little while longer. He was a beautiful person. Of all the people in this town that didn't deserve to die, he was the top of the list. Because he was better than everyone else. He looked after his disabled sister and helped his brother with his homework and loved his girlfriend with everything he had.

Everyone loved him. And I mean that. And yet somehow he fell in between the cracks. Somewhere along the way, he decided I CAN'T DO THIS ANYMORE, WHAT'S THE POINT IN LIVING, EVERYONE WOULD BE BETTER OFF WITHOUT ME. At some point, he decided that it wasn't worth thinking about anymore, and at that point, he died. His soul fled this planet long before his physical body did.

But that's my point. How many people are we going to lose to mental illness and suicide before something's done? How many people are going to take their lives because of bullying before someone mans up to the situation? How many people do we have to lose for someone to stand up and say "this is our problem?"

He has over THREE THOUSAND messages on his Facebook wall. So much love. And somehow he never saw it. It was too little too late. If he were alive, he would be crowing about how he had more page views than me. But he's not. He's been dead for three days now.

So yeah. He wasn't the thousands of people who died in Japan. He wasn't all the victims of Hurricane Katrina... he wasn't all the dead from the Queensland floods or the Christchurch earthquakes. He wasn't Justin Bieber, he wasn't Pete Wentz, he wasn't Robert Pattinson.

But to some people that's what he meant. He meant the world to us. And now he's gone. Forever. I keep thinking every time my phone goes off that it's going to be him, teasing me about something, asking to swap shifts with me at work. And every time I go to pick up my phone, it isn't him. It's someone else.

This post will be swept under the rug. These kinds of posts always are. They force people to face facts. Force them to confront the question every person must ask themselves as they leave childhood. The question that everyone dreads because they don't always know the answer.

Who am I? What do I mean to the world? What do I want my life to be about?

He was my confidant. My rock. And now he's gone. Not so rock-like. Tomorrow is the Relay for Life, which he was supposed to be participating in. It's traditionally for all cancer survivors across the world. Running through the night, the darkest point in any person's life when they're afraid.

But I'll be running for him. He was in pain. His whole life in those last two weeks was a nightmare, one he didn't see a way out of. But I know that tomorrow night, as I run, the There's always light at the end of the tunnel. We just go a little blind sometimes. In the morning, when the sun rises and I've been awake all night, sun will be rising somewhere.I'll have done it for him.

He's dead. He's not ever coming back. But we all carry a little piece of him, all his friends and family. We'll all remember. And he'll be waiting for us. But I don't think he'll mind if we're a little bit late getting to him.

If anything, I know this: the world didn't stop turning over night. The sun continues to rise and fall, the birds will always sing and the seasons will change. The world is the same as it always was, just missing one of its vital pieces. And in the end, aren't we all vital pieces? All God's children, all chosen to live, all with destinies and hands and hearts.

Like with Josh, I will NEVER understand why he died. More than that, I will never understand why he chose to take his own life. He had so much to give to the world. There was so much I never got to say to him.

So much that I never will.

[Somewhere between the end
And the point where we begin
There's a fire burning brightly
That's found its way to dim

When the feeling's gone
Shine on, shine on,
On to something new
It's long and overdue
I will remember you

Shine on, shine on,
And let the others see
You've got your victory
Will you remember me?]

-A Solitary Blue.

I'm Still Here

WARNING.

This will be one of those deep and meaningful posts.

So the other day, a friend who shall remain nameless was staying over at my house. We were just hanging, eating chocolate and watching movies (as you do at sleepovers) and she just suddenly stopped talking and stopped doing anything. I asked her what was wrong.

She told me, "I'm sick of being like this" and gestured to her whole body. She said, "I'm sick of not being what everybody wants. I'm sick of being me. I'm not thin enough, I'm not nice enough, I'm not pretty enough."

What sort of a world do we come from, that we beat ourselves up because we don't look like the toothpicks (commonly called 'models') magazines use to model their clothes? How is it that 2 percent of the world's population has an "acceptable" body to use as a model, and yet the majority of us, who don't starve ourselves (for the most part) strive to fit the minority of people?

When did ribs, hips and collar bones start becoming sexy? Since when has it been an achievement to not eat for however many days or cut however many calories from your diet and know it's stupid but feel proud of it?

There are so many fakes in the world, and so many losers. There are so many people who are selfish, and cruel, and incompetent, and live to make other people's lives hard. They're life's little hurdles, someone's sick idea of a joke when you're having a bad day. If you can't overcome some idiot who's stoned, drunk or otherwise ninety percent of the time, how are you supposed to make it in the world? They're tests. Of your kindness, patience, a test of the sturdiness of your faith. Among other things.

Everyone tries so hard to fit in, to conform to society's ideas of what is and isn't acceptable. What's wrong with stepping out of the circle, finding your voice, and being yourself? What's so wrong with wanting to live truthfully?

Everyone has a place in the world - all you have to do is look. Sometimes things don't turn out the way you think they will. Things get messed up, turned around, shoved into a blender and put on "fruit salad" and come out so messed up you don't think you'll ever sort it out again.

Here's some food for thought: even when you lie there at night and you shut your eyes and you wish you just wouldn't wake up, or that the kid teasing you would just die or get hit by a bus or whatever, or you're resenting someone or something and just want to give up... God keeps you breathing through the night. He could easily let you go without a fight, easily let your breath stop.

You might wish that you'd die. But you don't. You might wish you were thinner, but you aren't. You might wish you were nicer, but you aren't. You might wish that you're prettier, but you aren't. You might wish you're more talented, but you're not.

God loves you for who you are. Not who everyone else perceives you to be. Forget them.

You wish you'd die in your sleep. God could easily let you go.

But He doesn't. More than that, He WOULDN'T. God is strength when you have none. Just think that, for whatever reason... you're here.

[I am a question to the world
Not an answer to be heard
Not a moment to be held in your arms

And what do you think you'd even say
I won't listen anyway
You don't know me
And I'll never be what you want me to be

And how can the world want me to change
They're the ones that stay the same
They can't see me
But I'm still here
They can't break me
As long as I know who I am]

-a solitary blue

Beauty

So when I was in Melbourne last week I saw the most amazing, coolest thing ever. Me, Enyar, Mum and Uncle Brian (who's not actually my uncle but my dad's best friend) were sitting in the lounge area. There was this huge grand piano there.

Anyway, this little old lady came hobbling up the stairs and she looked about 200. We thought she was homeless because she was soaked from the rain and had this long greasy grey hair and had a little bag on wheels with her.

Well, we kept talking and this little old lady sat down at the grand piano and I wondered whether she was allowed to do that (because it looked like the piano might have been there for decoration, not for play) and just as we were about to get the hotel staff she began to play.

[How the universe began
What the future holds
Why do fools fall in love?
What happens to our souls?]

She was the most amazing piano player I've ever heard in my entire life. It was like listening to a professional. Here was this little old lady who looked like she might have, with all due respect, died any second, who looked like she was homeless, who was playing the piano like she'd been doing it every night of her life since she could even open her eyes.

I've never heard such beautiful music in my life. And then one of the elderly hotel cleaners started singing and I've never heard a nicer voice.

There are people all over the planet who look like they couldn't possibly carry themselves a step and then they start to create all this beautiful stuff - their art, paintings, they start to sing or dance or write and you wonder how do they do that?

[Clues to life's mysteries
Are what we hope to find
Always reaching for a reason
Searching for a sign]

Nobody stopped that little old lady even though she wasn't supposed to be on the piano because the music was so powerful it had everyone completely gripped within it. And I don't think anybody wanted to get free. Everyone wanted to listen. In a way I think the music was the woman's soul coming out of her body; she looked frail but on the inside she was strong.

You never know what people are gonna do until they lay down the final card. Even then you don't know if they're secretly hiding another whole deck beneath their coat or up their sleeves. You never know how far a person can be pushed until they fall over the edge.

I used to have a great friend and she was the best. We were polar opposites in more ways than one - she came from a Turkish family and had an older brother who smoked pot and her parents separated before she turned double-digits. My family is completely stable.

[She saw the bright lights
She caught the fever
Now we're coming back to earth
Oh hey, hello, welcome to the world!]

She took so much crap from so many different people. When I weighed 55 kilos she weight 100. She could handle anything. Her brother beat her up and her dad yelled and told her she was fat and her mother didn't care but she could take anything. She was a beautiful person.

And then she started liking this guy. And this guy didn't like her back. She went out drinking with him and she smoked and did all sorts of drugs. And when she told him she liked him, he told her she was disgusting and that he would never date a girl that looked like her. And she broke. Just like that.

I don't even talk to her anymore. She'd had enough of being the good girl that everyone underestimated, so she turned into the bad girl who everyone was afraid of. And people were afraid of her. And her cousins. I tried to stick by her but then people wondered why. I was guilty by association.

[You sit there on the couch
Sipping your scotch and ice
You turn the TV on
And tune me out again]

So she told me to leave. When I didn't she did everything she could to make me hate her so I'd go of my own accord and never look back. She told me my family was a joke and that she'd only used me to get to the boy she'd liked and all this other horrible stuff.

I was fourteen and I believed her. We still don't talk that often but when I see her I try to smile at her. She could take all that crap from so many people who were supposed to care for her and then the one person who didn't was the one to break her. I always wonder how such pathetic people manage to worm their way into our hearts.

[So what would you say to me
If you could talk to me
You ask anything, I wouldn't lie
But you're okay with this damaging awkwardness
So I'll just play it safe, keep it inside]

It doesn't matter what anybody else thinks so long as God looks down upon you and smiles. If you know you're a good person, and God knows you're a good person, why should you listen to what anybody else has to say?

Because they're our friends and family and we want them to believe in us. It took a long time for me to start believing in myself. For some people I don't think it ever happens. But you have to believe in yourself to be able to believe in Him. He never gives up on us, even when we claim He's not there or whatever.

A lot of people I know ask for proof that He exists. I just tell them to look around. How could anything so beautiful have evolved from single-celled organisms? It didn't. He was there. He made us and loves us and believes in us even when we fail in every way possible. His love was so great He sent His son to die on the cross for us.

[I look beyond the empty cross
Forgetting what my life has cost
Can I be the one to sacrifice?
Or grip the spear and watch the blood and water flow?]

There are so many things in life we take for granted. There are so many things that every day we forget to thank Him for. We walk, and we breathe, and we can feel the sun on our face. We know of birds soaring hundreds of miles above our heads, and of creatures of the deep that swim below us, and creatures that live in the forests - forests we're cutting down. Destroying.

He must feel every death like a dagger to the heart and yet He still lives within us and breathes new life into us every day, and when all is said and done, He is the one who takes us with open arms and allows us to return home, because He loves us with all that He is.

[To love you, take my world apart
To need you, I am on my knees
To need you, broken on my knees]

Despite what we are, who we are, He is there for us every day, listens to our sorrows and triumphs, knows our pain and suffering and joy and euphoria, embraces us as all we are and all we ever will be and never lets us slip, not once. He does not let us slip. We let each other slip. We let ourselves slip.

But He's always there to pick us back up, set us back on the right path, showing us which way to go. He loves us because we are. Not because someday you might jump in front of a bullet to save a pregnant lady. Not because someday you yourself might carry the next president or messiah within you. But because we're there. Our existence is enough reason for Him to see fit to love us.

[All said and done I stand alone
Amongst remains of a life I should not own
It takes all I am to believe
In the mercy that covers me]

So why isn't that reason enough for ourselves to love each other? Every day we lie to our friends and family, people steal and cheat and lie and they never own up to it and they certainly never take the punishment. Every day some poor girl is raped or some boy murdered and thrown in a ditch and their attackers are only sentenced to a few months in jail and then a good behaviour bond.

What? Good behaviour bond? I thought the general idea of being a murderer means you aren't well behaved at all! But apparently courts don't know that. We're letting it happen. We're letting all this suffering spread. Kids in Africa would have more than enough food if we stopped eating our weight in McDonald's every year.

Kids in India might actually have enough space to move - if first-world countries weren't so selfish with their immigration processes. Racial purity is a load of bull. We're all people so what's it matter?

[To rid myself of all but love, to give and die
To turn away and not become
Another nail to pierce the skin of one that loves
More deeply than the oceans
More abundant than the tears
Of a world embracing every heartache]

If it doesn't matter to God why should it matter to us? God doesn't care who you are or where you come from. If you love Him and Jesus with a heart wide open it guarantees you sanctuary. He loves us so much he sent his son to die for us, to linger on the cross for three days.

That's what love really is.

-a solitary blue.