(no subject)
I remember when we were seniors at T.Hill and Hannah got caught with pot in school. I remember having this urgent, uneasy feeling and thinking to myself - she has to get out of here. She can't breathe here, she's going to die here. I specifically remember the feeling of wanting graduation to come just so I could know that Hannah had safely graduated. I was so afraid she wouldn't make it through there. It wasn't an environment conducive to the essence of her...the freeness, openness, creativity of her. It wasn't until then, when I saw how upset and scared she was too, that I realized that if she had to stay there any longer, the life would be sucked out of her. She would die there. I thought that. I thought, when she gets out of here she'll be able to breathe...she'll get her life back.
The last time I saw her, i had the same thought. I thought, if she doesn't get out of here, she will die here. Her grown-up life, free of the restraints of Tower Hill, or parents, or her less experienced more cautious friends was scary. Full of darkness and drugs and pain. she didn't belong there either. It was an environment that took away her light, her air, her life. She was still my Hannah, our Hannah, but she had played too much in the darker ways of things, she had no one to bring her back from that, no one to stop her from spiraling. I cried after I left her that day. The sense that she could not survive there overwhelmed me, and I remembered my thoughts in those last few months at Tower Hill. I thought...she couldn't thrive there, and she can't thrive here. Where is it that she belongs?
Tonight, Witt and I had a really serious conversation about Hannah. It was always as if she wasn't a part of this world. Her place wasn't here. She didn't belong with us. She never talked about what she wanted to do in the future, never "when I grow up", never planning a marriage, a career, old age. She just lived, and everything was in honor of now, this moment, this feeling, this high. She understood better than any of us (especially better than me) that everything in life is fleeting. You see it, you touch it, and then it goes. All the true treasures of life are temporary. Hannah knew that, she never fought that. She loved so freely, she put everything out there for everyone she knew. No one, not one person, who was loved by her doesn't know it. She made it so clear, so painfully clear, how much she loved you, because she knew not to waste time. She knew it was now that mattered.
Ms. Flynn told me the other day that she in all honesty believed that Hannah was an angel who sort of glided down to us, did her thing, and then departed. I don't usually think of myself as a person who believes this stuff, but everything about Hannah was so moving, so intense, so beautiful and passionate and firey that there's no way it could have been sustained throughout a normal lifetime. And sure she got into trouble, and she wasn't a great student, and she loved illicit activities, but she cared deeply about everyone she met and i HONESTLY can not think of a moment when she said a bad thing about another person. She just emanated love and acceptance. She was just so alive, so on fire, so brilliant, that I can actually believe that maybe she was an angel sent to us for a very short time to let us see what it really means to be living. fully. every damn moment.
I actually believe what I'm saying in this post. I really do.
And yet, the entire time I've been writing it I've been wondering if I'm not convincing myself that I believe this in order to make myself feel better about her death.
And if you didn't know her, like even if you'd heard all about her and stuff but if you didn't physically know her....this will make no sense to you.
But I have told a million people who knew her about this whole weirdness and they all agree 100%.
The last time I saw her, i had the same thought. I thought, if she doesn't get out of here, she will die here. Her grown-up life, free of the restraints of Tower Hill, or parents, or her less experienced more cautious friends was scary. Full of darkness and drugs and pain. she didn't belong there either. It was an environment that took away her light, her air, her life. She was still my Hannah, our Hannah, but she had played too much in the darker ways of things, she had no one to bring her back from that, no one to stop her from spiraling. I cried after I left her that day. The sense that she could not survive there overwhelmed me, and I remembered my thoughts in those last few months at Tower Hill. I thought...she couldn't thrive there, and she can't thrive here. Where is it that she belongs?
Tonight, Witt and I had a really serious conversation about Hannah. It was always as if she wasn't a part of this world. Her place wasn't here. She didn't belong with us. She never talked about what she wanted to do in the future, never "when I grow up", never planning a marriage, a career, old age. She just lived, and everything was in honor of now, this moment, this feeling, this high. She understood better than any of us (especially better than me) that everything in life is fleeting. You see it, you touch it, and then it goes. All the true treasures of life are temporary. Hannah knew that, she never fought that. She loved so freely, she put everything out there for everyone she knew. No one, not one person, who was loved by her doesn't know it. She made it so clear, so painfully clear, how much she loved you, because she knew not to waste time. She knew it was now that mattered.
Ms. Flynn told me the other day that she in all honesty believed that Hannah was an angel who sort of glided down to us, did her thing, and then departed. I don't usually think of myself as a person who believes this stuff, but everything about Hannah was so moving, so intense, so beautiful and passionate and firey that there's no way it could have been sustained throughout a normal lifetime. And sure she got into trouble, and she wasn't a great student, and she loved illicit activities, but she cared deeply about everyone she met and i HONESTLY can not think of a moment when she said a bad thing about another person. She just emanated love and acceptance. She was just so alive, so on fire, so brilliant, that I can actually believe that maybe she was an angel sent to us for a very short time to let us see what it really means to be living. fully. every damn moment.
I actually believe what I'm saying in this post. I really do.
And yet, the entire time I've been writing it I've been wondering if I'm not convincing myself that I believe this in order to make myself feel better about her death.
And if you didn't know her, like even if you'd heard all about her and stuff but if you didn't physically know her....this will make no sense to you.
But I have told a million people who knew her about this whole weirdness and they all agree 100%.