Life is short but sweet for certain

Three years ago this morning, my life changed in a heartbeat. My mom woke me up to the news that there were two girls standing in our living room, crying. My friends Bonnie and Michelle were there, both with Kleenex in their hands.\nWhen Michelle finally managed to get out a few words, she said "John and Stacy…"\nShe didn't finish the sentence; she didn't need to. Somehow I knew. It turns out that two of my best friends, John and Stacy, had died along an Arizona highway the night before. They weren't wearing their seatbelts and they were going somewhere around 115 mph, not a good combination. \nStanding there in my living room, it took me a second to digest the news. Strangely, everything seemed ok. At John's house, everyone was in tears, and it wasn't until I picked up his sunglasses that my hand started shaking.\nTwo nights earlier, we had all driven up to Phoenix for a Dave Matthews Band concert, the last memory that I have of John and Stacy together. Under that pale blue sky and under the weight of the hot desert air, I enjoyed my final moments with my friends. If only I had known.\nWe sang, we danced, we celebrated our upcoming graduation. And when Dave Matthews sang "For life is short, but sweet for certain," I had no idea that his words would ring so true in such a short amount of time.\nI have that concert on tape, and somewhere beyond the band's playing, you can hear the cheer of the crowd. Somewhere in there are the voices of two individuals whose lives were cut short. Two people who never got to experience final exams, living in an apartment, falling in love or all the things that come in between.\nSometimes late at night, I envision their final moments. I see a car veering off the highway, rolling over and over before finally coming to a stop. I see twisted metal and broken glass, and I know that somewhere, at some odd mile marker on some desolate stretch of road, lay the bodies of two of my friends. There are few harder things in life than having to sit with your best friend's mother as she sits and plans her son's funeral. \nAmazingly, another of my friends actually survived. Kristen had been in the back seat and somehow managed to escape the grasp of death. She spent that summer in the hospital, and I visited her every chance I got. Seeing someone who was so vivacious attached to so many plastic tubes was quite depressing.\nI brought her a poster to put on her wall at the Tucson Medical Center. Amidst numerous "Get Well" cards, we found room to put it up. After she managed to learn to walk again and talk again and feed herself, she sent my poster back. It now hangs on my wall, a reminder that even in the darkest of tragedies, sometimes light shines through.\nLast night, for the first time in three years, I cried. Maybe I'm finally beginning to realize that my friends aren't coming back, maybe I'm starting to see how final death really is. Maybe, as one of my friends just told me, I'm learning to let go.\nWe take our relationships for granted, and one day, when we no longer have the opportunity to say what we've always felt, the guilt and regret that courses through our veins is more painful than the loss of life itself. Sometimes I listen to the tape of that concert we were at and I hear death being 65 years away. I hear people dancing to the future, of times that never came. If only I had known.