R.I.P Rico

No one learns from anyone else. Everyone is invincible. Too many die too young. It is all avoidable, or is it.

I was invincible once, or so I thought. I have definitely had more than nine lives. The lucky ones get to look back and see just how amazingly lucky we all were to survive, but why if we all know this, and if there are so many unfortunate examples out there, does this keep happening.

The only way to keep someone from doing something stupid is to physically stop them and even then there is no guarantee. We don'r try hard enough. We don't yell loud enough. We don't put ourselves out there enough to say "hey, guess what, we did it, it was stupid, we are lucky to be alive."

We also don't take enough time to make certain these examples are taken with the weight they should. It is ok to say to a student, a player, a young person on the street, you are worth more than this. You have your whole big, beautiful, long life ahead of yourself and don'y f--- it up. So few take the time, or have the courage to put themselves out there that those that do are viewed as weird for caring, different, "sketchy."

When did it become "sketchy" to care, to try and help, to try and make a difference. I don't know the answer exactly, but somewhere between 1976 and 2001.

We have created this world where any real show of caring or emotion, any attempt by a "stranger" to do something nice, is met with skepticism, as best. We need to turn this around. We need to fight back. We need to make it ok again for people to be good to one another and to care. We need to not accept complacency as the norm anymore, and active caring as different, or we will continue to lose our children!!

I learned from you Dirk, I couldn't get to you, but I learned. R.I.P. Dirk.

Thank you again for getting this far with me.