Life is a precious, precious thing. The beating of your heart and the inhaling and exhaling of air through your lungs is the greatest gift one can possibly receive. It is something to treasure and cherish, whether it belongs to you or someone else.

You may have seen me moping about the status updates section lately over the loss of one of my closest real-life friends. He was just a couple of months older than me and was going 12 rounds against Leukemia, I believe. He was a very close real life friend of mine and he has left a crater of an impact on me and many others.

To say he'd be missed is an understatement. Ever since I received the news I haven't been able to stop thinking about it. I can't focus in school and I've been coming home just to lay in bed with no desire to get up and do anything. I have become less active in both real life, on Skype, and on these forums. I desire little socialization right now, and the only person I've been talking to with any form of consistency is my best friend, Obsidian Sky.

My schoolwork has been suffering and my notably bad performance on a test made it likely that I'm going to fail my math class this 6 weeks unless I can pull off a miracle, but that's highly unlikely. I can't help but drift towards thoughts of "I'll never go to his house and spend the night again" and other things like that. I have so many fond memories of the things we used to do together and the fact we will never do those again has me totally shattered to the point where I just don't want to be active anywhere. Normally I'd be fainting at the prospect of failing a class, but all I can do is just mourn to the sky with that to the back of my mind.

I never thought he'd die when I heard he had cancer, either. Never once thought it, and I mean that sincerely. I just brushed it off as a battle he'd have to fight and overcome, and there were amazing rates of survival, last I checked. I thought he'd make it, and therefore I didn't think twice about sending him those "I'm busy, man. Maybe some other time?" messages when he wanted to go do something.

Life is not to be taken lightly, though - especially for those you care about. As cliche as that sounds, there are no truer words out there. Just think about that, because when you get godsmacked over the loss of a loved one, you won't be able to help but think to yourself "Man, I wish I had them around."

Because there is nothing I would like more than to turn back the clock and see my friend again - but that won't happen anymore. The knot of the mortal coil is one that can come unraveled very easily, so do everything you can to keep it tied together.