Lessons

         Mike died in January.  I spent the rest of that year vacillating between palpable anger and a grief so thick I had to relearn how to function.  He had jumped off a building in Mexico.  It was only 3 or 4 stories, and he might have survived the collision with rock cement, had it not been for the potted plant that broke his fall, lacerating his internal organs with its terra-cotta shell.  Mike’s death came by no means as a surprise to any of us.  Those who knew him from grade-school were shocked, in fact, that it had taken so long.  I, having met him shortly into my journey of sobriety, had always been astounded by how he managed to get by on a daily basis.  Offensive, contrary, and unreasonable he managed to offend as many people as he befriended.  His addiction ripped any semblance of sanity from him.  His schizophrenia caused demons in his head. Both alienated him from the people who loved him without pause, and so he took to the road.

         Upon hearing the details of his postmortem, we were horrified.  His mother had to buy a plane ticket to Mexico where she was to pick up the remains of her dead, 27-year-old son, her only son.  Because he had been in the country illegally, there was an enormous amount of paperwork to be done in order to get his corpse across the border.  In the end, she had it cremated to allow for its timely return.

         It was perhaps hardest for me to comprehend this last part: that he wouldn’t have taken his family into consideration when deciding that Mexico would be the best place to end his life (let alone when deciding to end his life at all).  Then again, perhaps rationality is never a key factor in such an act.  It was his final drug arrest in Nevada that sent him over the border to Mexico, and essentially prevented his return.  He would not go back to jail.  And so, I finally realized: he knew, from the start, that Mexico was a one-way trip.

         In the two and a half years since I lost my best friend, it has been the lessons that Mike taught me simply by being himself that have moved me the most.  He had no time or concern for what others thought of the long chestnut hair that flowed down his back, or the fact that some days he just didn’t feel like wearing a shirt.  What he displayed to the world was what he displayed to his friends and those closest to him.  He felt no need to apologize for who he was.  He had no patience for judgement - upon himself, or others - and allowed his irreverent, and ever-honest personality to shine through no matter the venue.  But Mike’s greatest gift to me was the brief but wondrous time in which he allowed me into his life.  The joy I garnered from a friendship with such a unique, hilarious, troubled, brilliant, compassionate individual is incomparable.  The fact that I can’t think of him without a smile and a chuckle and a shake of the head is proof of his lasting impact upon each of us who knew him, and perhaps upon all who encountered the phenomenon that was Mike.