Absent mindedly, I kick around the coffee cups that lay scattered around my room as I wonder where exactly my story began. Today is my 17th birthday, lost somewhere in the shuffle between being too old to start driving and too young to go out and buy cigarettes or vote or order things off of infomercials. It seems to me that after the ages of 16-21, birthdays begin to become ordinarily blank boxes on our calendars, often circled or highlighted but never fully acknowledged. I have come to look at my birthday as a type of achievement, sort of a ‘hey, seventeen years. Great job at not dying.’ because in all honesty, there have been some times where it hasn’t been all that easy to keep my fragile lungs breathing and my heavy eyes from closing.

Imagine waking up on your birthday, a day especially for you, and hearing the drowning shrieks of a boy who had not yet reached twenty playing back in your head. This is the significance that my special day holds for me. Just one year ago, on November 10th, I had my entire world shaken apart when I found out that Daniel; a surfer, a mentor, and a friend so close I had considered him my older brother, had drowned the morning before. He was buried at a funeral I was unable to attend on the day of my 16th birthday. He would’ve found the irony in his situation hysterical. C’mon, a surfer? Drowning? Some days, I still cannot bring myself to hardly crack a smile at it. A year later, and I am just starting to forgive the waves for taking what was not rightfully theirs to claim.
Dan was a surfer in many ways. He was an explorer of the soul. He could bottle up grief, anger, and guilt like no other, but he learned to ride his emotions like the waves. Call me cliché or sentimental, but if there was one man who was going to change this world, it was Daniel. His world outlook radiated beauty, and his passion spoke more than words flowing out of his lips ever could. Slowly, the weight of Daniel’s passing eased its way onto my shoulders and left me hunched over; each morning I woke up unable to catch my breath. If a man so precious and full of potential could be whisked away so soon, why was I still here? Dan already had a career set in front of him at the young age of 19. His life was seemingly limitless; endless roads diverged in front of him. The kind of beauty that Daniel held was a rare kind that I have yet to find in another human soul.
Once I finally came to the abrupt realization that this world would never again see the warmth in Dan’s smile or the glimmer in his eyes, I expected to feel utterly empty. But where the gaping hole in my chest should be, I now carry a new weight in the deepest part of my heart. I’ve vowed to carry Daniel with me so that someday I might just find a way to show the world who my big brother and best friend really was. There is no way I could even dream of displaying the fullness of the passion and energy he put into life, but if each day I can show someone a sliver of his beautiful soul, maybe then the world will see Daniel smile again.