It was a Friday night around 5:30pm, 1 year ago today, I was out with a friend when I noticed that I had 4 missed calls from my mom.  I called her back and she was hysterical, I couldn't understand what she was saying.  "Your cousin Sebastian is dead, he killed himself".  It was on of those things that you hear, but that your brain just is not allowing you to register and just leaves you frozen.  I called my mom back and my grandmother answered the phone and she told me what they just had learned.  Sebastian had gone to the roof of his building (where he had lived with my aunt, uncle, his brother and his sister), jumped and left no note. 

My cousin Sebastian was/is my closest cousin.  Even though we lived so far away, we connected on a level ever since we were little.  We both grew up in a single parent household, dealt with the emotional pressures that comes along with being in our family, shared our dreams and what we were going to do to make them happen and were there for each other as we were growing up and we shared a mutual interest in finally becoming accepting of our spirituality.  We knew the pressures of growing up the way we did and even then as adults what we were going through, we knew we were not saints by any means but we knew that there as a higher power looking out for us.  He also encouraged me to start writing a blog.  He told me that I should "just for fun" just to get out some of my energy.  And that I may never know, people actually might start reading it. 

In the time before he passed Sebastian had just graduated from a prestigious law school, just turned 24 years old and was excited about the path that his life was taking him and he was in love.  All things that look ok, aren't as such.  Apparently he was having some issues that he wrote about in his journal, there was some issues that he had at home since he moved back and he was having severe relationship issues with his girlfriend and that he had just found out she was unfaithful to him for the second time.  As much pain as I was in after he died, I couldn't help but say to myself that he wouldn't have done what he did if he wasn't in such pain.  After learning certain events leading up to it, it was a consolation for me that he wasn't in pain anymore.  I knew that he wasn't coming back, I knew that we would no longer laugh and go out and share our thoughts on our everyday life and I knew that we would never meet the man of my dreams, one thing he always said he wanted to do, so that he, acting as the father figure in my life, let me know if he was the one for me.  I refused to fuel the forces that were feeding my family into a negative mourning period.  They were divided and were placing blame on different people and it was ugly.  Having that spirituality connection with my cousin, I reached out to it, after my mourning subsided a bit, I reached out to him.  I spoke to him and he helped me get through those hard times right after he died.  It was hard to accept that he will never be there physically but I knew that he was so living in my heart and I could see him and talk to him whenever I wanted.  

Now a year later and even though I'm come to terms with Sebastian not being here, that can't be said for most of my family.  Me and my aunt Lilly really connect on the fact that he really is in a much better place and that perhaps his plan wasn't to be here but to serve a higher purpose.  I believe that.  Whatever torment he was in before he died, doesn't take away from the amazing person this guy was.  I have been in situations where I've really been at a loss, whether I've lost my keys, ATM card, or just been sad.  I've looked to Sebastian and prayed to him and like the amazing man he was, I found my keys, found $50 bucks to keep me going till i found my ATM and have seen something that has made me laugh hysterically.  That's how I know he's there listening, he gives me these gifts to let me know that I was not alone and that he's always looking out for me.  And I thank him that he hasn't left me and he never will.  He lives within me and he is still my closest cousin. 

I love you Sebastian and miss you.