5 Thoughts for when a Friend Passes

Here's a picture of Paul from when he won a scholarship for his artwork.

This past Friday night, I received the very unfortunate news that Paul Bucci, a friend of mine from high school had taken his life and was no longer with us. While I was not as close to Paul as some of my friends are, Paul and I did spend a decent amount of time together in high school. Anytime our friends got together to play football, he was there. He didn't like basketball much, but sometimes he'd even play that with us too. I first met Paul sophomore year, which was the year I found my main group of friends throughout high school, whom I still see every break. Paul struck me as a goof, in the best way possible. He was goofy and absolutely hilarious. When we played football, he was a monster. He spent his freshman year playing fullback on the school team, where he would run straight at his opponents, and in many occasions, light them up. After freshman year, he hung up the cleats, joined the track and cross-country teams, and stuck to playing pick-up games with a bunch of (at the time) scrawny track kids. Paul was strong, and he could hit hard if he wanted to. But what was so interesting about him, is that all the strength he had was natural. He didn't spend his time in the gym lifting to get big like the rest of us. Nope, when Paul wasn't doing schoolwork or playing sports with us, he would spend his time doodling and creating drawings and cartoons. Paul's artwork was incredible. It earned him a scholarship, something I forgot entirely until I started looking back on his life. Why did I forget? Because Paul was so humble, he never spent his time telling people how great he was. He just was great.

As I hinted earlier, Paul was also a great character. No one will ever steal his place in my "top 10 funniest people I know" rankings. Later in this blog, I'll share some stories about him, however putting them in writing simply won't do them justice. You'd have to know Paul to appreciate Paul, and if you never did know Paul, I feel sorry for you, because you missed out on an amazing human being. On top of being "the funny guy", and even more important, Paul was a good friend. He was a very easy-going guy. If you heard that some of our friends were ever arguing about something ridiculous, you could try to guess who was arguing, but your last guess would be Paul. Paul could get along with anyone. Over the course of high school, I got to know Paul pretty well. By the time senior year rolled around, we were pretty good pals. Freshman year of college, when Paul was at University of Wisconsin-Madison, was probably when I was closest with him. Paul and became good friends, and we were able to talk to each other about any kind of troubles we might have been facing. The summer after freshman year, better known as last summer, Paul's family moved back to Pennsylvania. This robbed us of another summer with him. Some time during this past year, he deactived his Facebook account, and slowly we started to drift apart. As you grow up and enter college, it becomes more difficult to stay in touch with everybody. You can only have so many people in your life. I had hoped that Paul would make a visit this summer and we could catch-up, but sadly that wasn't the case. The last time I saw Paul was winter break freshman year, his last break when he lived here. A couple nights before he headed back to school a few of us got together for wings and chilling. When it was over, we had a little bro-hug and said our goodbyes. The thought that this was the last time we would ever see each other on this planet never crossed our minds.

These last few days have been unlike anything I have experienced before. I've learned some stuff, re-learned some stuff, and spent a lot of time journaling and writing poetry. Through it all there have been five things that have stuck out, and I would like to share them with you.

1. Nothing lasts forever.
In Ecclesiastes 3, it says that there is a time for every activity under the heavens:

There is a time for everything,
    and a season for every activity under the heavens:
2     a time to be born and a time to die,
    a time to plant and a time to uproot,
3     a time to kill and a time to heal,
    a time to tear down and a time to build,
4     a time to weep and a time to laugh,
    a time to mourn and a time to dance,
5     a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
    a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
6     a time to search and a time to give up,
    a time to keep and a time to throw away,
7     a time to tear and a time to mend,
    a time to be silent and a time to speak,
8     a time to love and a time to hate,
    a time for war and a time for peace.
-Ecclesiastes 3:1-8

What do we see in that text? There is a time to weep. There is a time to mourn. There is a time for death. Death is inevitable. For me, being 19 years-old, death isn't something I spend much time thinking about. After Paul's death, it felt like this is where life starts. As depressing and as messed-up as it is, death is a part of life. No one knows their time. Life could end at any point for any of us, and when it comes to life, none of us will make it out alive. I would love to think that everyone else I know will live to be 70 or 80 years-old, but that probably won't be the case. We can take care of our bodies, and keep them in tip-top shape by exercising and eating healthy, which we should do, but life could end at any moment. No one knows their time.

2. I never want to hear another suicide joke.
As somebody that has experienced depression, I cringe whenever I hear someone make dumb remarks such as, "Man, I'd rather kill myself than take that class." No you wouldn't. Any kind of "I'd rather kill myself than ____" is not funny. I see no purpose to making these statements. I cringed then, and I don't know how I'll react now. People that take their lives were suffering from an insurmountable amount of pain. They are constantly hurting, and they've hit a point where they feel like life can't get better and that they have no other way to end the pain. The pain is just too much for them to bare and they feel that they cannot keep going, so they end their lives way sooner than their lives should end, and all of the people in their lives are devastated. I know I'm hurting pretty bad right now, but I can't imagine how some of my other friends that were best friends with Paul feel, or how Paul's family feels. So you really want to keep making those jokes?

3. Take it easy on the Jesus stuff.
For those that know me or follow this blog, know that I am a very passionate Christian and probably are surprised by hearing me say this. But the truth is, Christians can do more harm than help when trying to comfort someone. I don't want to single anybody out, because this is a pretty common thing I've heard from people not just to me, but to others that are grieving the loss of a friend or a loved one. I'ts a modified version of Jeremiah 29:11, which reads "For I know the plans I have for you,' declares the Lord, 'plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." I'll hear something along the lines of, "this is something out of our control, and it was a part of God's plan. God's got a greater plan and while we might not understand it now or ever, this is just a part of his plan." Wrong.

God does have plans for us if we choose to follow Him. But it never was God's plan for Paul to take his life. This whole spiel makes God sound like some kind of sadistic sicko. God NEVER wanted Paul to kill himself. That wasn't his plan. It's never his plan for something like that to happen. But we live in a broken world, and things like this do happen. That's not to say that God can't work in terrible circumstances (Romans 8:28- "And we know that in all things, God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose."), but God doesn't create those circumstances.

The last thing somebody that is mourning wants to hear is that it was a part of God's plan. It only makes you angry and if somebody isn't a Christian, it can really turn them off to Christianity for the reasons I've listed earlier. If you want to help somebody who is mourning, the best thing you can do is just be there for them, and be present. One of the things that has helped me the most is the encouragement and love I've received from friends. The people that just talk to me, and be with me, and will talk about whatever I need to talk about. Maybe we'll talk about something completely unrelated to Paul's passing, but if you want to help someone, the best thing you can do is offer them your friendship and prayer. Hearing that I have friends praying for me makes me feel loved. Perhaps you can send the person a Bible verse or two, but again, take it easy on that stuff. Let them come to grips with what they are dealing with, and if they want to talk about that stuff, they will.

4. It makes our other problems seem so small.
The previous things that had been burdening me completely faded away after hearing about the passing of Paul. We all have troubles. It's a part of life. But after working a twelve hour shift yesterday at my job, that was one of the hardest tasks I've ever had to do. Working when I'm feeling sick now seems incredibly easy. The daily problems I might have now feel like nothing. That's not to say that I won't still have little troubles, or that we should completely ignore those things. I like to ask my friends a lot how I can be praying for them. A lot of the time a response I'll get from people is "I'm good, thanks." Looking at things with this new perspective, I can completely understand why people might say that now. It's because they don't want to be a "prayer hog" and waste God's time on something that might not seem as important as other tragedies that are going on in the world today. We still should pray for the little things and we all have things that need to be prayed for, and you any time spent with God is never a waste. But I can at least understand it now.

I guess the main point here is that we might stress over smaller things, but we don't realize how good we have it. I am in good health, I have an amazing family and the greatest friends in the world. I am extremely blessed. Sometimes we just need to be grateful for the things we have, and look around and appreciate them while they're here, because we don't know when they might leave us.

5. There is a time to mourn. 
Going back to the Bible passage I discussed in point number one, there is a time for everything. There's a time to mourn. Losing a friend isn't the type of thing that you can just get over by watching Netflix, eating ice cream and hanging out with friends. No, it might not be a quick fix. I don't know how long it will take until things feel "normal" again, or if they ever will, because I've never coped with something like this before. But it's okay to be sad. A terrible thing has happened.

But the thing that has helped me the most is to take a moment and think about all the good times we had with Paul. One of my closest friends, who was also one of Paul's closest friends, came over on Sunday. We shared some of our favorite Paul memories. I went through and reread all my Facebook conversations I had with him and when I did both those things, I spent a lot of time laughing. One time when we played football, Paul was blocking me on the play. He certainly was stronger than me, and he decided to keep pushing me backwards, while making funny grunting noises. He was on a mission. He started blocking me further and further away from the play, meanwhile the whole time I was laughing. I probably could have maneuvered around him, but it was just too funny. He ended up blocking me in to the end zone, and then out of the end zone, even though there was no touchdown on the play. I can't do it justice in writing, you had to have seen it. Paul had a lot of funny moments like that when we played sports. One time he was at another friend's house, playing NHL on his Xbox, and he scored a goal. He got so excited that he chucked his controller against the wall. Paul had his funny, goofy moments like this that cannot be replicated in writing. But the more I look back on the good times we shared, and the funny things Paul did, the more I smile, laugh and appreciate those times. It still is a tragedy, and we are all still coping with the loss, but maybe these kind of stories can give us the laughter, happiness, and hope we need to get out of this tunnel of darkness. I'm happy that the good times happened, even though they had to come to a very abrupt ending. Thanks for all the memories Paul, we miss you so much.



PS I thought I would show a picture of a shirt that Paul created for one of our friends, Ian Feeney.

He truly was a great artist, and he was even working on a logo for Viva La Vita. Sadly we'll never see it. I may make a lot of friends and meet a lot of people in my life, but I will never meet another Paul Bucci. Rest in peace, my friend.