03/05/06

Saturday marked the five-year anniversary of the death of Eric Suurmeyer.

That's not going to be a name common to all of you; maybe not to any of you, but it's a name that I'm familiar with and it's a name that's important to me. See, Eric was a good friend of mine in college. During my sophomore year, he was a freshman who lived in the dorm room immediately adjacent to mine. We played video games, watched movies, visited the Mall of America and Ikea; we did all of those typical things that college kids who are friends do with each other.

More after the jump.




One particular memory I have of him is around Valentine's Day. About a week and a half prior to that day, Eric got drunk and disorderly enough to require a visit to the local Detox center. My girlfriend and I, we went to pick him up. When we got there, he told us that he had-- hilariously-- met a girl. It was amusing, in one of those "Really? In Detox?" sort of ways.

He wanted to take her out on a date for Valentine's Day, so he made plans with the help of me and my girlfriend. He didn't have money, as he couldn't find a job within walking distance of campus (and it needed to be within walking distance; Eric's car broke down the first day of school) so his money was all borrowed from his parents or earned through pawning stuff off. To have enough money for all the romantic things-- the flowers, the dinner, the whatever-- he was planning on pawning his Playstation 2, as he now mainly played his XBox 360.

So he called the girl about a week prior to Valentine's Day, all ready to pawn off his stuff to pay for a nice date for her, and asked her out.

She told him that she already had plans with her friends.

Things like this, they happened to Eric a lot.

On the fifth of March, in 2006, my girlfriend and I ate an early breakfast in the dorm's cafeteria. When we were coming back up to our dorm, we saw Eric's room mate flying down the hall, his phone in one hand. He got to the door and tried two or three times to open it. I started laughing a little bit; who had trouble opening a door? As soon as he got into the stairwell, he ran down the stairs and, as I heard his voice retreating, it became apparent that he was on the phone with 911.

My girlfriend and I dropped what we were doing and ran to Eric's room.

Just from seeing his feet hanging off the end of his bed, you could tell he was dead. He had taken cyanide tablets during the night.

It was sad. I don't entirely know if it was surprising. See, things that would make a guy consider suicide, they happened to Eric a lot.

This was maybe four days before Spring Break 2006, and my girlfriend and I had made plans to go down to Florida for Spring Break, the same place where I am as I write this. We decided we'd leave early, skipping work and class due to the tragedy, just so we could get away-- at least for a little while-- the idea of Eric; we were asked by a reporter about Eric while we were packing up our car.

On the highway I drove almost on auto-pilot. But after a while, I noticed something odd: a flock of birds was following my car. And not only for a moment, but for an extended period of time. The birds actually followed my car for five miles down the road.

Now my left forearm is covered with the silhouettes of birds, just like I saw following my car.

I miss Eric. But I'm glad I'll always remember him.