11.18.2007

If You Party Tonight


An old friend looked me up on Facebook about a year ago.

Some time last Saturday morning, a Washington College sophomore, Patrick M, was found dead in his room at Kent house.

Blair C: “you may not remeber me but I went to middle school with you. anyway for some reason or another you and Sly popped into my head the other day and I just wanted to say hello.”

I didn't know him. We took the same freshman seminar last Spring, but he and his lax buds didn’t seem to take much seriously and I wondered often if they saw beyond their four years here.

Out of nowhere; after eighth grade she disappeared. I heard her parents got divorced – that's it. That was high school.

It took until three Saturday afternoon for President Tipson to email campus with the sad news as well as his condolences, but by then I’d already received Facebook invitations to the candlelight vigil, not to mention the groups --

Now it was college and she was doing alright. The last thing she wrote me: “I'm going to school, assistant teaching karate, and well stuff that people do. you know eat sleep party so on and so forth. everything is running pretty smoothly.”

'In Loving Memory of Patrick M' and 'IF YOU PARTY TONIGHT 11/17/07 – R.I.P. Patrick M.'

I never wrote back – I assumed we had time to catch up.

His profile is still there, busy with messages, well-wishes for his family, the odd uninformed invitation to hang out this Winter break.

After a week of navigating Facebook – or eating sleeping partying I suppose – she'd contacted just three others from middle school. Then she was killed in a car crash.

A best friend’s public plea for direction.

Sly told me over the phone two weeks after the fact – he thought somebody else would have told me.

Pat has five-hundred-forty-two "Facebook friends."

Anyway, nobody knows her password, so nobody can change anything and her profile is still there.

He’s quoted in his own "favorite quotes" section:

It’s desolate; no favorite quotes, books, movies, interests, sexual orientation, views on politics, religion.

"Only thing i need is a big and good heart to live long!"

A name, a birth date, a grayscale photo she took herself which reveals her neck, hair, nose, mouth, fingers.

Bless you, Pat, you were wrong.

Even without eyes anyone can see she’s gorgeous, was gorgeous.

His funeral was packed, I heard. I’m not one of the hundreds who loved him so sincerely – hell, I barely knew the guy.

I look until I’m sick, and go back to doing my homework.

But I know too well the unanswered knock could have been at my door that morning.