Rich

I graduated Escanaba High School in 1990. At that time, I had alot of friends at all the area schools, Gladstone, Bark River, Rapid River, Mid Peninsula, and North Central. In fact, right before graduation, a few friends of mine and I really wanted to graduate from Gladstone since most of the people we hung out with were from there and we didn't like the Escanaba attitudes. Of course that was a generalization at the time, we had a huge group of friends at our school, it was more of a feeling of rebellion I'm sure. I was a huge Eskimos fan though, went to every single football game, we were undefeated two years in a row and my sweetheart at the time was a football player. Well, we broke up a couple weeks before prom, our senior prom, so I asked a former boyfriend to go with me as friends. My best friend Michelle was asked by Rich Sarasin and she didn't feel comfortable going alone. He too, was a football player, on defense as I remember and very good. He was a very big guy, super shy, and blushed all the time. He mustered up the courage somehow to ask Michelle and she said yes. We had a great time all of us friends. Rich asked me after prom if Michelle wanted to go out again. She didn't have any interest in him more than a date to the prom and he was heartbroken. I would catch a glimpse of him sneeking glances at her, nervously, he was just smitten. Once we all graduated, I never saw Rich again.
Then this past Monday morning, he was in the newspaper. He had been living in Marquette, had a girlfriend and worked there apparently. Well, this sweet guy passed away too young(only 34) of an apparent heart attack. A friend of mine thought that all the deaths I have seen lately are the stage of life I'm in, that you just know more people that die. Well, I think I will have to disagree- being in your thirties and knowing someone nearly every week in an obituary is not normal. I can't explain what is going on, but I sure have been shown life in a different light.