A Rant: Van Farrier

At age 19 I've done what I consider to be quite a few things.  I've climbed tall mountains, canoed the entire Connecticut river, I've made friends, lost friends, gone to college, and gotten scholarships. I've met movie stars and sports stars.  I've gotten lost, and I've fallen in love.  I've written speeches and I've passed notes.  I've directed plays, built a shed, mowed a lawn, and driven a car.  I've raised money for charity's, and been a charity case myself.  I've done a lot of things.

But at age 19 I had not experienced watching the death of a loved one. 

I'll never forget when I found out.  The same day he did, the amount of communication was so helpful.  It was cancer, pancreatic cancer.  He found out, it was February 20th.  Here today stands, March 9th, and he is gone from our lives forever.  I've cried a lot in the past few weeks, but now I'm just in shock.  I don't know what to do.  Should I cry more?  It doesn't seem real again.  Maybe it's because I'm so far away, so very far far away. 
I told all my professors what was going on, and of course they were all supportive, which just reminds me even more of him. 
He was so much more than a teacher to me and now that he is gone I feel so lost. 

I'll never forget when I told him I decided to do theatre instead of engineering.  That I wanted to do what I loved instead of what I thought would make life easier.  He seemed so proud.  I didn't get to tell him until a couple weeks ago that he was the one who inspired me to make that change.  That he was the one who taught me to love theatre.  That he was the one who had changed my life forever.

And now he's gone.

Here comes paragraph four.  I was hoping by the end of paragraph two I'd be back to reality because I really just want to cry more.  I just want to cry until every tear is gone.  But less than 24 hours later I feel like I've run out of tears too soon.  Is this how I'm supposed to feel?

He was just a teacher, this isn't supposed to happen.  This doesn't happen to people like him.  This doesn't happen to people like me.  We are from a small town, we don't even have a mayor, we're too small!  We have cows, and tobacco farms.  My graduating class was just over 100 people.  This wasn't supposed to happen to us.

Cancer.  People aren't supposed to die from cancer anymore.  Cancer is supposed to be "a thing of the past" already!  People are supposed to still survive cancer.  I mean look at Patrick Swayze! He's still acting, while Mr. Farrier, an amazing person, and a teacher! Is dead! How is that fair??!! How is that fair at all?

I mean how are we all supposed to move on? How are we supposed to know what to do? 

I never got to say thank you.


I'm never going to get to say thank you.




Thank you Mr. Farrier.  Thank you Van.  Thank you.


Thank you....


Thanks...