Ugh
TW: death, suicide
It’s technically fall, but I imagine most people are in jeans to appease the Instagram
gods they’ll be pleading to later today; continuing in their drunken stupor till the early morning
hours but crafting that picture perfect caption sometime before noon. Before the alcohol really
hits during that darty they may or may not have wanted to go to.
I’m part of this group, not exactly sure how willingly though to be perfectly honest. I
don’t have any alcohol to calm my mind, though at this point I’m not sure how calming it would
be with the cocktail of meds already in my body. I think at this point we may be up to three or
five medications daily (note to future self: the number does go down, and the meds feel far
more effective). I don’t wonder aloud how many people around me have seen a psychiatrist.
I’m wandering through the thinning crowd, looking to people to stick onto. I eventually
find some not-super-close friends, but tag onto them fiercely as I don’t want to seem like a
loner. We take a picture that I personally don’t particularly like, but I post it to Instagram
anyway because I need content and maybe it’ll help me feel more in tune with my peers
(spoiler: it doesn’t). Though I do think about how many of us share that anxiety of hoping that
our posts will pass a certain number of likes we deem satisfying enough to keep it up. This is
where I think I may finally connect to some of my peers, even if it’s a superficial level.
There’s people here that I don’t necessarily know, but have had some surface-level
conversations with. I’m not completely aware of what goes on in their lives beyond the simple
“hi”s and a “hello”s we share. I think we all try to not imagine people we rarely talk to as
complex because we’re already entrenched in trying to understand those who are closest to us;
how are we supposed to pick up on cues we don’t even know exist?
The day I’m reliving is Fall Fest of 2018, and I’ve been trying to avoid thinking about it
for a full year as of now. That was probably sometime in late September. I’d like us to now jump
to October 25, 2018 for a second. This day probably doesn’t stick out to many of us. It didn’t
for me until I stumbled upon some old text messages that reminded me of the email I received
that day. I was running late to a class because I had taken so much extra time on my exam in
the previous class that I was literally over 20 minutes late at this point. I see messages from my
best friend saying that she wants someone to talk to in this group chat we’re both in; I message
her separately to ask what’s going on. She says to check my email. I wait till I get back to my
room after my final class. When I read it I drop my phone in an almost theatrical way because I
kinda think about dropping it before I actually drop it and then it’s already somehow on the
floor. President Altmann doesn’t include a trigger warning (death and suicide, be cautious
please if you continue), and I remember dissecting that email so many times, constantly trying
to nit-pick what is wrong with it and why exactly it pisses me off so much (yes, present tense).
I’m thinking at this point that hopefully someone reading this realizes what I’m talking
about. It was the email about Emmie Nicholas’ death. It’s hard to even type her name.
I’m writing this hoping to somehow heal this part of me, that putting this out there,
even if it’s never printed or posted anywhere brings me some sort of solace. I can’t help but
think about all the other people that’ll never get there.
I hope that we all just take a moment and remember her, because she existed and was
here and had an impact, whether you felt it or not. She made beautiful art and was funny and
maybe I think about her too much. She walked these same paths like you and I, listening to
music probably. She once told me that she would just add albums and listen to all of them in
order, each song one by one in their perfectly linear but randomized lineup, waiting to be
heard.
I wonder how long she had been waiting to be heard, and that maybe none of us did.