A Reason

When I was little I was close friends with my neighbor boy. We had a cute preschool relationship and I remember being in his house once. I was with his mom in the kitchen and she asked me if I could get a box of cereal for her that was under the cupboard. That was the only time I got to see her because soon after, she committed suicide. My mom talked to me about this when it happened, explaining the neighbor boy's absence and behavior. "Isn't that good though mommy?" I asked. "Won't she go to heaven and be happy now?" My mother shook her head and looked at me with sad eyes and told me people who commit suicide don't go to heaven.

I have decided to disagree with my mother on this. Despite the fact that I'm questioning God I guess there is some part of me that is deeply attached to Him. The Bible does not say that those who commit suicide go to either Hell or Heaven. I believe that God is merciful and will do more than just stand by and allow his children to be condemned to hell because they could not withstand the pressures of our world.

I bring up this memory because I've been on YouTube listening to a song meant to be in memory for a boy who committed suicide in the April of 2011. For some reason I decided to look him up and its amazing what seeing a face can do to a person. I couldn't get it out of my mind that this boy was once alive, smiling, making beautiful music, and yet now no longer exists on Earth. He played the Cello. He had red curly hair. He was a beautiful human with, from what I read, a beautiful soul.

A similar feeling was when I was with my sisters in my dad's car. We were driving to Wooster for lunch when I received a text from my friend Cali. She said to pray for her friend that was in the hospital. He had shot himself but he had hung on for a while. There was a name in the text and I asked my sisters if they knew him. "Yeah," Sarah said, "why?"  Looking down at the text I read them what I was told and they both stared at me. "That has to be a joke." Sarah said. "Seriously Laura, who sent that?" I just shook my head. "Cali." Things went by in a blur receiving more texts, Stephanie and Sarah talking about how sweet the boy was and  about how shocked they were. Eventually they texted Cali.

This is what I want time travel for. To be able to go into the past and reach out to those people that were mistaken as happy. This is what makes me question my dreams of being a photojournalist. Can I be an Art Therapist instead? I feel the need to help people. To make a difference.

In memory of those who were mentioned in this post.

Ask for help,
-Laura

I didn't mean for this post to be disrespectful of the people but to really remind myself that they were alive and had stories to share at one point.