Transatlantic

(09/03/2010)
I was informed Friday that one of my oldest friends was in a terrible accident. My understanding is that he had to be recissitated at the scene, and is still in a coma. Although the details I have received have been few and far between, it looks like he is going to make, although there are still so many concerns about his long-term well-being.

It's been a strange experience going through this. Of course I feel grief that this happened to my friend, I feel helpless because there is nothing I can do about it, and I feel frustration because I have such little detail. In the past, whenever I have experienced something like this, I have been surrounded by the tragedy. Everyone around me has, if not been feeling the same way, at least been aware and sympathetic. Even though it feels awful, you want to feel the grief. It feeds off everyone around you that feels the same way. It's the way it should feel in a time like this. Of course you would take it all back. Change everything so that the event might never happen, but you can't, so you wallow in your grief.

It's been different here. There is nothing but my own thoughts and a couple of pictures to remind me of my friend and what's going on. There is no one here to share my grief with. I have only told one person here, not because I don't think anyone else will care, but because I know that they will. They don't know my friend though, and even though these are great people, and I know their sympathy would be genuine, it just wouldn't seem right. Because of all of this, I haven't felt it the way I want to (that is to say the way I think it should feel). I also feel the distance between me and home now more than ever. I might as well be on a different planet.

I initially didn't want to write about this at all for a lot of reasons. The obvious being that it's very hard to talk or even think about, but it also just seems voyeuristic to write about something so tragic on something so public. I was worried it would feel like it marginalized the situation in some way because I know that my writing can't do justice to the levity of the situation, and that, in comparison, every other insignificant topic on this blog will pale in comparison. I talked it out with a friend from home, however, and in the end I decided to just be honest and write about what I was feeling.

All my best, Scott. I love you, and I'm so sorry I can't be by your side through this. In two years we'll have a cold one on together on me. High class this time, though. Second cheapest beer on the list.