I miss you.

I don't even remember what state or city I was in. I had gone out of town to take a friend to a youth conference. The weekend had been going well, for the most part...until one of the days in the afternoon, like I said, all of the details are very blurry. My sister started texting me and telling me to call her immediately, that something terrible had happened. I called her. She was weeping. I couldn't make out the words she was saying. I asked her to calm down, and then I heard...he killed himself. Matthew Brett Coven, a son, a brother, a husband and a father of three small children, took his own life. The details surrounding and of his death still horrify me.

Matthew was a dear friend of mine. He and his beautiful wife, came into my life when I was in high school. They started attending our church when they only had their eldest boy. Emily and I babysat for them often...but as time went on, they became more than just parents of the child we babysat, they became dear friends. We would have AI (American Idol)/ Amazing Race parties, we would eat ice cream until our bellies exploded, we would drink more Diet Coke than 100 people could in one sitting, we would talk until late in the night about life. We would laugh. We stood by their side when their second child was born and had major medical issues.

And then they moved to Little Rock and I to Texas. Emily still remained very close to them. Visiting them often. Matthew's wife, Morgan, became Emily's closest friend. And I lost touch. I would hear about them through Emily, and keep tabs with them that way. I would visit them every once in awhile when I would go home. But for all in intention purposes, I lost touch. I naively gave up that friendship.

I went home after I left Teen Mania, and I didn't want to go. But a dear friend told me that I ought to go...that it was important. I did and on the way home we stopped by Matthew's house, had dinner and caught up. That was the last time I ever saw him. I'm so grateful my friend told me to go.

See in those five years that I lost touch, he made a series of poor choices, ones that affected his whole family. I wasn't there for that...I only remember the good times. The way Matty once was. Which in many ways save my heart from a lot of heartache. But there is also a huge part in me that regrets losing touch with him. Wandering if he only knew how much I cared about him, how I wasn't judging his actions and calling it his identity, how much he meant to me and my family if there might have been a different outcome.

I'm not one who lives in regrets, and I'm not going to begin now...my wandering thoughts, however, beckon me to consider the importance of human life, and human connection. Acting on the love you have for one another...not just waiting until it's convenient. Because, in my case, there is now no convenient time, because there is no time.

It's been a year. And I miss him. A lot.