As I settle into life, the death of a friend hits me harder

Mike Rowell was coming here this month for a friend’s memorial service and to help his parents with a garage sale. In a message on Facebook, he asked if I would come.

He signed it, “Much love, Mike.” I was excited to see him.

I met Mike Rowell at the State Press, the student newspaper at Arizona State University.

We had a mutual love of thrift stores and punk rock music and because of that, Mike thought I was cooler than I was. He would loan me stacks of records.

“You need to hear these,” he’d say. He was right.

Mike knew everything about music. He was funny and smart, using words in his stories that, when I became his editor, I had to look up in the dictionary.

After graduation, Mike left for San Francisco, where he wrote about music. We kept in touch by phone and Facebook.

It was on Facebook I found out Mike had died.

I’ve lost a handful of friends. Mike is the third from the State Press (all, coincidentally, named Mike).

The first, Michael Konz, was killed in a workplace shooting in San Diego five years after we graduated.

We were 25 and still hadn’t figured out how to do our taxes.

Mike Ritter died in 2014, after emergency surgery.

We were 48 and still believed 50 would be the new 30.

Until then, death had taken grandparents or parents, not friends, people the same age as me.

I’m mad Mike is gone.

It forced me to think about death when I am so invested in my life, enjoying my son, flourishing in my job, rejoicing in new babies in my family, painting again, tap dancing with friends.

Instead, I will think of Mike and his kindness, offer to help with that garage sale when the time is right, and listen to the music he loved.

Much love, Mike.