In Memoriam of a Great Man

Hello followers. It's time to be honest, it's been a rough few months for me. Between getting in a serious car wreck, losing 3 people who I knew well, among other major shifts in my lifestyle, I've had a lot on my plate. 

First, however, I'd like to address that I really like the direction my blog is going in. I feel proud of every post and it is my firmly held personal belief that everyone can take something from all of them. In order to continue with such profundity in my posts, I will no longer be holding myself to posting once a week. I may post once a week still for a while, but if the inspiration is not there I'd rather wait for it than force a lame post. Thank you to everyone who continues to read, regardless if you do it because I badger you or not, it's nice just to see that I've already reached 131 views as of this post!

Moving onward, yesterday I went to a funeral. It wasn't my first funeral. It was, however, my first soldier's funeral. The whole service, disregarding subject matter, was beautiful. It really made me feel a lot closer to this country that I call home. The service was for a friend of mine named Jordan Riddle. As stated, he was a soldier and his feats were great. He was a combat medic and I can't even name how many medals were displayed next to his casket. Besides being a soldier, however, Jordan played a more important role in my life. He was who I looked up to in rehab. There were thirty men there at any given time, but he was one of only two other people who had a heroin addiction such as I. He was who guided me, and gave me the most useful information in my month stay there. Afterward, I still visited him for a while, hung out at his house once. One of the main reasons this particular death was so tragic to me was because not only did I live with the man for 30 days, but also he was one of the few people who truly deserved the large amount of praise he received upon passing. In person Jordan put up a hard defense, poking fun at you and appearing to have feeling made of titanium. While he was no doubt a tough individual, there was another side of him, the side that pushed him to be a medic that took care of people during firefights in a war zone. That was the best side of him, but it was that same side that allowed him to have the negative thoughts and feelings that ended up taking him over in the end. If you knew Jordan you could see in his eyes that how he was acting on the outside wasn't always how he felt. The way he stared off into the distance. The way he would be silent for several minutes on end sometimes. The way he felt alone even around company was almost tangible at times. What I'm getting at is, I've been to several funerals and sometimes I just realized sometimes people say "so and so was a great person and would always go the extra mile to help you and drop whatever he was doing" and most of the time its just a bunch of lies that people say so that their loved one can go out with dignity. Jordan was truly everything great you can have in a person, and had a great personality to go along with it.

That's all I have to say. Jordan, you will be missed.