One picture = many words

Left to right: myself, Shedrick, Brandon, Derek. Circa 2005ish

I don't know why but I'm thinking about Shedrick a lot lately. I carry him with me on my wrist so it's like I see him everyday. But I think I could just really use him in my life.

I recently talked to Brandon after him moving to Virginia and becoming a ghost. He did what he had to do though and it was good to catch up.

Derek was living in the city I just moved to... and then he left right when I got here. But we still keep in touch and he is a great guy.

I think I want to get these posts out of the way before I do a whole blog-redo and try to get some new people to come on board.

But really, I think I just love this picture. And how simple everything once was.

30 Days of Me: Song That...

Ok, I felt like putting "Song That Makes Me Cry" would just be a little off-putting in the title.

And I guess I can't go with Mumford and Sons, because right now I have been listening to their cd and it so good it damn near makes me cry. Seriously, I haven't felt this way about music since I discovered Coldplay.

Speaking of Chris Martin and Co., there are two songs by them that have gotten to me over the years, but that is for a different post.

Honestly, and I hate to get mushy on you guys but the post kind of calls for it, there is only one song that comes to mind.

On this blog I have talked a lot about my good friends, Shedrick and Cynthia. There were both taken from us within a 6 month period. It hit us all because they were both in our senior class and both passed our first year after high school. Plus, they were good friends with a lot of people so we all had a lot of shoulders to lean on.

However, I first dealt with death as a freshman. There was a girl I liked when I was in seventh grade named Connie. She denied my passes (stupid middle school), but we ended up becoming really good friends later. It was to the point that my first semester in high school, which was actually a really hard time for me, she used to call and check up on me. One Monday she called and checked and we had a good conversation. I remember because I got off the phone to go watch wrestling. I also remember because it was the last time I ever talked to her.

She got into an accident the next weekend and didn't make it. My friend Andy was basically staying with us at the time and they were kind of "talking" so it hit him really hard. I remember when we got the news, we just left the house and started walking down the street. It was really tough there for a little while.

One of the songs he constantly played was "The Dance" by Garth Brooks. It summed up everything we felt. That no matter how sad we were, we were happy to have known her.

I may not have her initials tattooed on my arm like I do with Cynthia and Shedrick, but it doesn't mean I don't miss her. I do, and if "The Dance" ever comes on I think of her.

30 Days of Me: Happy Photo

*Today's post is a "photo that makes you happy." This pictures is Shedrick and I at one of our high school pep rallies. I can't even explain how much fun that was, hopefully the picture kind of shows it.

My Most Epic Wordless* Wednesday Ever

*I am actually going to speak a little bit, but whatever.

Remember this post? Well, I actually left something out that I did at the beginning of spring break.

While we are going back, remember this post also? Well I teased an "epic" WW post and one of my friends has informed that I am nearly considered a liar if I don't get around to posting it, so here it is:



Why is this considered "epic"?

Well, you can click at the bottom of this post on the tag "tattoo" to see that I've been talking about it for a while on here. But I've only had my blog for a year (as I type that, I think I realized that it's like officially a year old).

Yep, I just checked. Blog is officially a year old as of last Saturday :)

I posted stuff on myspace about it back in the day as well. Basically, I've wanted to do this for a long time.

Some of you have already seen this and you know the story. If you don't know it but want to know, just ask me (okarmmr@auburn.edu). For some reason, even though I've talked about it on here, I don't feel like explaining it on here.

And yes, it did hurt. Not excruciating pain, but annoying pain.

And I almost passed out at first. But I'll save that story for later...

A Lifeless Ordinary

*Title is from a track on the new cd by Motion City Soundtrack. Got that cd on a whim the other day and so far have been really impressed.

First off, thanks to everybody who saw the countdown, both the days leading up to it and the actual start. I knew I flooded your reader last week, so I tried to calm it down. I will probably be a little more quiet on this blog in the coming week or so, checking in every once and a while (and of course on Sundays). But I want to focus on my side blog, Mr O at the Movies. I just talked about Terminator and I have seen about 5-7 movies since then, including ones that have been around for a while, one I have seen a few times already and one that I saw in theatres. So please, check that out.

Big news: I received an award! I got it from Cassie at Southern Domestic Goddess. It was the following...


Pretty self-explanatory, but I need to pass it on to five other people. The first two are damn near veterans to this page (ok, one doesn't exist anymore but I have to pay homage) and the second two are newcomers but awesome people. The last is someone who just left a comment, but it was a GREAT one, so there's that. Those who should receive this:

The Girl With The Pink Teacup

Lola Lakely

Smart Ass Sara

JerseySJov

- kimmy -

Now, I would normally update all the craziness going on in my life, but that can wait. Right now, I want to share a little story that i was reminded of today in public speaking class. (Jme, I think you will appreciate this)

In my senior year, I was in government class and we had to recite the Gettysburg Address. My friend Shedrick didn't really do a good job of studying for it, which wasn't surprising, as he wasn't what you would have called a straight A student. His plan of studying was to tape himself giving the speech and listen to it over and over. We both sat in the back of the classroom and at times we would get in slight trouble, not for talking, but for laughing as Shedrick used to say the craziest stuff. Well, on the day of the speech we had one of our classic "What if?" scenario conversations and I couldn't keep myself from laughing at the prospect. I urged him to do it and when he got up there, our teacher looked at me and saw that I was trying to hold my laughing in and he knew something was up.

What Shedrick did was put the tape recorder in his pocket and pressed play and began to mouth the speech. I swear, it was one of the funniest things I have ever seen as the entire class couldn't stop laughing. The greatest thing about it? The teacher was one of the ones laughing the hardest. After a full day of hearing the same speech recited over and over, he said he needed something like that to happen.

Needless to say, he had to do it again and I believe he at least got a B on it. But that was one of those "never forget" kind of days.

*Tune in Sunday!

**More regular blog posts coming next week

Random lyric of the day:

I always knew I had the answer
But I never understood the question

Violence is in me I think I have developed a Passion

So as you guys have probably become aware, I have a best friend in the blogging world. Jme (actually spelled Jamie, but this is how I choose to spell it), from this is me; consequently, and I have known each other since middle school, but didn't become friends until early high school (that's a whole different story, haha) Being friends that long, you start to have some things in common and share a lot of things. We share things that happen to our hometown, favorite shows we watch and bands we listen to, and develop the kind of friendship that allows you to be a male on the bride's side at her wedding. But with that closeness, you also start to have the same friends. And when you both lose a mutual friend, you can turn to each other for comfort. Four years ago this month, we both lost a mutual friend and after conversations about it, we decided to do something for him. That is where this idea of guest posting has come in. She took the time to jot down her thoughts and they can be found below. If you are interested in mine, they can be found at her blog.

I remember it like it was yesterday. This moment was permanently burned into my memory. I will never forget.

I was sitting in my dorm room with my roommate, watching t.v., talking, waiting for Aaron to call me, trying to decide whether or not to go to the Ludacris concert on campus. The phone rang. I just assumed that it was Aaron, but instead it was Matt. He told me he needed to tell me something, and I could tell, from that phrase, from the tone in his voice, that something was not right. I couldn’t even fathom what it could have been, but I knew it was bad. My heart dropped and I started feeling queasy. I can’t remember his exact words, but I remember it being so blunt that I couldn’t wrap my head around it. “Shedrick died.”


It was almost like my ears stopped working. I couldn’t hear what he was saying. No, I could hear it, but my brain wasn’t processing it. “Who? Who?” Shedrick? Shedrick who? Not our Shedrick. Not the guy that wanted me, his little punk rock friend, to rap the intro to his mixtape. Not the guy that was just asking me two weeks ago to come visit him the next time I came home. Not the guy that got up in front of our class to recite the Gettysburg Address with a tape recorder of himself playing in his pocket so he didn’t have to memorize it. Not my unconventional friend. It finally sank in, and I broke down. I waited for hours for someone to call and tell me that it was just a joke, or that they brought him back to life. SOMETHING. Please.


That never happened. I mourned. We mourned. At his funeral, I couldn’t even cry. All my tears had dried up. I wanted to, but my eyes were tired. They burned.

I couldn’t even bare to look at him in his casket, because I didn’t want that to be my last memory of him. I wanted my last memory to be warm and happy, not cold and sad.

For a while I felt so guilty. Like, some how, some way, there was something I could have done to stop it. There wasn’t. And eventually came to terms with it. Since then, there hasn’t been a day that has gone by that I haven’t thought of him. Some days more than others.
It has been 4 years, and I can still hear is voice when I close my eyes and try.

So this one’s for you, Shedrick.


Keep watching over us.

(Editor's Note: The above picture was made by jme herself, and the caps read "I would much prefer it if you were alive and well")