lost in life....lost in death

grey skies fill my sunny day today.....this morning was supposed to be the beginning of a good thing, i started work today, but instead it has quickly turned into a very sad day for me....and my family......and the family of so many others......

we received news this morning that a very dear friend of ours has died......he was a good kid, i say kid cause i loved like a little brother, but he was a young man....he was a ball of energy and at times had a love for life so strong that it was contagious.....dont get me wrong, he had his issues and demons just like the rest of us.....the only difference is that he wasnt always able to stop them from controlling his life.....when they would take over, he would become a person that i did not know....he would be full of anger, hate and rage.......

he was raised to believe in certain things but in "growing up" he had began to leave some of that behind him and look to believing in God.....he wasnt all the way there yet, but he was working on it......he was lost somewhere in the middle of what he knew and where he knew he needed to be......

he was a very loved friend.....i feed him, was at his side through many loves and heartbreaks.....by his side while he found his true love.....he came to our house for an escape cause he knew it was always there......he was like family......the kids loved him and he loved them......

when they left for iraq, i made him promise me to take care of stephen, and he did.....the night before we left fayetteville, he hugged me tight and kissed the top of my head.....he told me thank you for always being there for him and for everything that i had done for him.....then he made me promise to take care of his "brother".....as we said our goodbyes, i PROMISED him that i would always be there for him and that i would stay in touch.......

right now i have this overwhelming feeling of pain and quilt.....maybe if i would have made better efforts to stay in touch, maybe just maybe this tragedy would not have had to happen.......i feel that i let him down and that i did not fulfill my promise to him......that is something that i will have to deal with for the rest of my life.....

he was also a loving and dedicated daddy....he fought for his son with everything that he had in him......was still in the fight up till the time he died......he leaves behind a loving wife of only a few short months and a baby that he didnt even know that he had......his wife/widow just found out that she is pregnant.....

it is a shame that he was taken before his time......he could have been great in this world once he finally got "all the way" there......i say that it was not his time because unfortunately, he took his own life on the 12th of july......my prayers now will be that his soul will be able to find some kind of peace outside of heaven.....i pray that his wife will be able to continue to be strong and raise their baby by herself and that she will one day be able to forgive him for leaving them sooooo early so that when their baby grows up, she can tell them all the good things that there were to know about their daddy.......i pray that as she is now solely responsible for the cost of his burial(suicide is not covered by the army)that she will be blessed and that God will make a way for her.....

today, i must say goodbye to a close friend, to a brother........Carl Benjamin Lennis McCoy, you will be deeply and truly missed.....today i promise you that i will do my absolute best to keep up with your family and make sure that they are ok for you........i will always love you kid