Someone I knew 15 years ago died suddenly yesterday.

To call him a friend would be a mis-characterization of our relationship and would trivialize the many full, dear friendships he did have in the impressive life he lived.
I knew him best in freshman year of high school. We sat at the same table at lunch. And we argued. Every day, we agreed to disagree, and we exchanged words, and we rolled our eyes at each other, and we laughed. We called each other terrible names that we didn't mean. We called each other terrible names that we did mean. And we smiled and gesticulated wildly and we thoroughly enjoyed each other's company. "Fighting" with him was often the highlight of my day. We respected and reviled each other.

After our lunch schedule changed, we fell out of touch. I didn't know him at all after high school, except for what I learned from Facebook, which seems to be an accurate account:
He was in law enforcement, a parole officer.
He had a wife and three boys under the age of three, whom he loved dearly.
He loved God and shared this love with others.

He and I have been Facebook friends for years, but I don't think we ever interacted -- not one Like, not one comment. We were still on opposite ends of the political spectrum and I had to force myself to refrain from arguing with him on more than one occasion. His opinions, though always expressed intelligently and diplomatically, made me angry -- not playful high-school-lunch angry, but irrational Internet angry. So I didn't engage. We were not friends.
Still, I watched his Facebook life in awe. He had a beautiful family for which he was demonstrably grateful, and I loved seeing pictures of his sons. He had grown into a father, a husband, and a proud public servant. He was a good man, and to hear his friends tell it, he was a Godly man.

I don't fully comprehend the sadness I feel. I valued him, but I didn't really know him. I don't even know if I liked him. But he was a good man and a friend to many, and his death is just flat-out unfair.
He touched my life more than I was conscious of. His ripples were far reaching. All of ours are.
I am so profoundly sad for his wife and children. Having a child, I can't help but try to imagine what she's going through, and even just the imagining is insufferable. I am sorry. I am sorry. I am sorry.

...

He filled a page in my freshman yearbook -- an epic poem in Sharpie -- full of swears, obscene inside jokes, and confusing stick figure drawings. And then, upon hearing that my mom might see it, he scribbled out the obscenities and replaced them with kind words. He was thoughtful like that.