Writing Through Grief: How My Relationship With My Best Friend and Processing His Death Made Me a Better Writer

August 2020, If not for Covid, this would have been a normal family vacation. Family, fun, and fishing usually defined these weeks on the lake that my family took every year. This year though, my mind was heavy first with dread, then with heartbreak. The latter would stretch me to the brink until I could no longer maintain my usual stoicism. Little did I know at the time that the upcoming grief would shape my path as a writer and make me a better man.

I arrived on Grindstone Lake the first weekend in August. My family and I were set to spend a week on the lake, as was tradition in our family since I can remember now. I chose not to tell my family that my best friend Steve, whom my family knew well both from my friendship with his brother and the two of us attending karaoke events every Thursday night until our jobs would no longer allow, was in the hospital fighting for his life. It didn’t seem necessary. After all, he’d been getting better. But on that Monday in August 2020, everything changed.

I woke up Monday morning early, much earlier than I normally would. Perhaps it was because deep down I knew something was wrong, but I remained hopeful. Steve had been improving after all. But just after 7am, I got the message that would shatter my world as I knew it.

Steve passed away at 7am, the message read. It was from Steve’s girlfriend, Nicole, who had been keeping me informed the whole time. I sipped my coffee, trying to remain calm and keep it together. It’s what Steve would want, I would tell myself. But after my first cup of coffee, I caught the faint smell of menthol cigarettes despite not having smoked in two years, and it all came crashing down.

Once the tears were gone and I had recovered from my sudden flood of grief, I couldn’t help but smile. I thought about Steve and his third shift 11 to 7 work schedule. 

I guess he wanted to punch out one last time; I thought. I think I even said that to Nicole in a message, but I don’t remember anymore. Once I had gotten past the tears, tears I hadn't cried in that quantity in years, I made a silent vow to myself. I was going to dedicate a relaxing vacation—and a career in what he and I both knew I loved—to Steve. The past no longer mattered, but I knew I’d have to confront it if I wanted to move on, and for Steve, I would do just that.

How I Got Here

Steve and I met when I was in sixth grade. I was friends with his younger brother Dan, and his family quickly took me in as one of their own, not knowing the storm that was going on in my young mind. 

I didn’t have the same aspirations during those times as I do now. If I did, they were clouded by my backwards worldview that centered on pleasing people and being liked. I was blissfully unaware of how temporary all these friendships I thought I was building were—and how artificial they were to boot. Dan was an exception, as was Steve. But when they moved three hours away halfway through my seventh-grade school year, it all seemed to fade away. Dan and I kept in touch, spending hours on the phone, trading phone calls to share the long distance charges—that was a thing kids, I swear. Eventually though, the phone calls stopped coming, and years went by in a blur. Then, when Dan and I were seniors, everything took a turn on a chilly day in January that could have changed the course of everything.

The Accident

January 6th, 2007 should have been a turning point for me. Dan came down to visit that weekend, and we needed to kill some time.  While on a back road Sunday drive, even though it was Saturday, Dan and I ended up turned over in a cornfield, the culmination of an event that changed our lives.

That day should have put things in perspective, showing me how fragile life was and how close mine was to ending. My 18-year-old self was someone you couldn’t tell anything though, and I continued on the same path, a path that the man writing this wishes he could go back and correct. What I didn’t know then was this event would bond our families for life in ways neither of us understood. 

Chance Meeting: A Light in the Darkness

Fast forward another eight years. I was living in a trailer with another friend I’d gone to school with, a situation that resulted from a senseless fight with my mom a few years prior. It wasn’t going well. I was in a dark place, drinking heavily, and unsure of where I was in life or where I was headed. My writing passion had fizzled out, it seemed. Everything I wrote seemed juvenile and stupid, so I gave it up, not knowing the effect that decision would have.

 I felt alone in that trailer even when I wasn’t. I would drown my loneliness in whiskey until the windows in my bedroom were masked with empty bottles. I felt lost, unsure of myself. That was until a Thursday night visit to my favorite hangout changed my life for the better.

This night, along with many after it, is hazy in my memory, but I remember meeting up with Steve, having a couple drinks, and after the friend I was supposed to meet bailed on me, Steve gave me a ride home at the end of the night. It seemed mundane, but that night would be the first of many bright spots in a dark period in my life.

It wasn’t long before Steve and I were hanging out every Thursday, taking part in the karaoke festivities. I didn’t know I had a talent for singing beyond singing along with my favorite songs when they played. Steve showed me that and brought me out of the shell that had been imprisoning me for so many years. With every Thursday night, we got closer, and Thursday nights turned into any time we shared a day off. It all felt right. I finally had a friend that I could talk to about anything. No matter how bad things got, I didn’t feel alone anymore, even when my home life fell apart.

Moving Back Home: The Gut Punch I Didn’t Know I Needed and Steve’s Support

I felt a punch to my gut in the summer of 2017 when I had to move back in with my parents. I felt like I’d failed, like I wasn’t worthy of anything. Steve stuck by me through it, offering long talks after karaoke on Thursdays. These talks helped me realize that though my feeling of failure was normal, moving back home when I did may have been the best thing for me. After all, with his help, it led me to rediscover my true passion.

 I remember one talk we had in the bar when I told him about my writing aspirations. I’d told no one about my story ideas before this point, but I told Steve about a story I had thought of, and his response was immediate and emphatic.

“Write it.” He said it without hesitation. Though I wouldn’t publish anything until almost a decade later, this conversation was the catalyst that reignited my writing passion. From that point forward, a small piece of everything I’ve written has been dedicated to him, even when the distance between us was greater than it had ever been.

Difference of Opinion: The Rift

Steve and I drifted apart in what I believe was the fall of 2018. He and Nicole had become serious, and I had begun seeing her estranged best friend. Hindsight tells me I should have heeded their warnings, but I gave her the benefit of the doubt for reasons I didn’t understand then but are clear to me now. I was lonely and she was in a profession I’d seen myself getting into if not for my physical difficulties. She was a soldier and a police officer, both uniforms I’d aspired to wear. I didn’t understand it then, but I think I was living vicariously through her. Little did I know that this relationship was costing me a friendship I cherish to this day, and how abruptly it would be taken from me.

The Final Message: The Day My World Shattered

August 3rd, 2020 is a day I’ll never forget as long as I live. Steve had been in the hospital in a coma for over a week. Nicole was giving me updates as they came. I was drinking heavily again, masking it in superstition. I drank a toast from a bottle of Jim Beam Black Label, the last whiskey I’d drunk with Steve, every night before bed during his hospital stay. Every time I did, I got good news from Nicole the next day. But as I sat in a house on Grindstone Lake, trying my best to enjoy a family vacation as I sipped coffee much earlier than usual, I had a sinking feeling something wasn’t right.

Just after 7am, as I was sitting down with another cup of coffee after futile attempts at returning to sleep, I took a quick glance at my phone. I noticed there was a message, likely from Nicole. This meant one of three things; either Steve had improved, his condition hadn’t changed, or he’d taken a turn for the worse. The message I got flashes in my mind constantly to this day.

Steve passed away at 7am, the message read. My first reaction was disbelief. There was no way. Someone was messing with me. When it sank in, the realization hit me like a fully loaded semi truck. My best friend was gone.

I cried that morning in a way I hadn’t in years, and haven’t since. I tend to be stoic in these situations, often to a point people accuse me of not caring. On this August morning however, the floodgates opened. Once I’d recovered and slowed my breathing and heart rate, I made a silent vow into the wind over Grindstone Lake. I was going to do what Steve always said I could. I was going to write and make money at it. 

The In-Between: Uncertainty, Rejection, and Self-Doubt

My journey as a writer officially began when Steve passed away. I wrote several stories that, had he been here, he would have said the same thing he always did. I used the page as my sounding board, releasing all the pent up emotions I’d been holding onto since he’d been gone. I wrote furiously, laying bare all my regrets. The page doesn’t judge, just like Steve didn’t. I could express every emotion I could feel. All the while, the page just listened. In a sense, the blank page, an enemy for much of my life, had become my best friend. Then one day, in November 2023, after countless files of words no one else would see, I took the plunge. 

I started blogging on Wix in November 2023. The lack of traffic and engagement since then is something I’ve likened to Stephen King and his story about the nail falling out of the wall under the weight of all his rejection slips. I write, I learn, and I appreciate every view and engagement I get. All the while, I’m growing as a writer and as a man. Every word I write, post that gets little to no engagement, rejection for monetization, and tick of the clock is a learning experience. I continued to write, even creating other blogs to help further my development both personally and professionally.

2025: The Blogger Experiment and What It Became

I started writing my Novelist Notions blog on Blogger in January of last year. I used it as what I called a creative reset. I was a little lost on Wix and thought a clean slate on a free platform would be a good way to find my footing. At least it couldn’t hurt. I published my first post in mid January, still struggling with keeping to a posting schedule. At this time, Blogger became a sort of online journal for me, a journal I shared with people online. I didn’t have a particular niche in mind in the beginning. I just wrote whatever was on my mind and published it. What Novelist Notions became results from what I like to call a happy accident. 

After posting periodically for over a year now, I look at Novelist Notions as my writing craft and mental health blog. You wouldn’t think those two things would go together on the surface. When you think about it though, there are a lot of intersections. Self-doubt, imposter syndrome, and that stubborn myth that all writers are tortured artists are just a few things I’ve written about on this blog that combine writing and mental health. I’ve also written about the various distractions we face as writers, how they’ve affected me, and how I deal with them. I consider my two-blog approach successful, and I’ll carry it into the foreseeable future. 

What I’m Doing Now, How it Makes Me Feel, and My Thoughts on the Future 

I started blogging in November 2023 with a brief hiatus in favor of a free approach mentioned above. I haven’t seen the traffic I envisioned when I started, but I’m learning there are many reasons for that which have nothing to do with content quality. Though I remain undiagnosed, I’m certain ADHD has played a part in my sporadic writing and posting schedule. I work every day to get better because I want to do what I love—writing—as my primary source of income. To make that happen, I know I need to be consistent. The thought brings me back to an article I wrote recently about writing as work, which I’ll link here in case you want to check it out. I’d watched a YouTube video in which the creator interviewed Lee Child, author of the Jack Reacher series. Child talked about losing his job and going into the writing process with a commercial mindset. He talked about showing up even when you don’t feel inspired. Though I still struggle, his words resonated with me, and I’ve been working hard to keep myself on task. 

As time has gone on, I’ve discovered that no matter how prolific I am, the combination of disability awareness and writing is a niche combination to say the least. With this in mind, I expanded my content to include typewriter and analog writing content. I began with a post about the typewriter revival, which you can read here. This content also includes a short story series that begins with a story called “The Correspondence” in which the protagonist goes in search of something to spark his creativity and finds a typewriter at an estate sale. When he brings the typewriter home, he discovers he can communicate with the previous owner, a writer named Margaret who passed away a month before the sale, through the keys. Throughout the story and his conversations with Margaret, he discovers things he never knew about himself, both as a writer and as a man. I know the word cathartic gets thrown around a lot, but that’s how “The Correspondence” felt for me. I feel I became a better writer and a better man by writing it. 

Conclusion: Bringing it all Together

I don’t have but a few good friends as I sit here, but I wouldn’t trade any of them for anything. That includes Steve, whose memory inspires me every day to write in some form. I’ll always remember how Steve supported me when it felt like no one else did. Though he’s not here physically, he lives on every word I write, every song that plays while I work, and in my every thought. The bond between best friends is something that transcends universes. 

Going home is not a setback unless you let it be one. It turns out that during my time back home, I’ve been able to help my family as much as they have helped me over the past decade. Though mistakes are part of life, they shouldn’t define you, and neither should your circumstances. 

When someone—even me—gives you advice, it’s important to make sure you listen carefully. Don’t just hear what people are telling you. Listen to what they’re saying and how they’re saying it. It could mean the difference between taking one fork in the road and the other. 

When things feel too difficult, never give up. But don’t be afraid to take a step back and possibly take a different path. You never know where the other path could take you. You might discover something about yourself you never knew. You could stumble upon your next big adventure. Find your version of my lakefront cabin and go for it.

What are your biggest aspirations? What do you feel is getting in your way? Leave your thoughts in the comments below or feel free to email me through the contact form on the homepage. I’d love to have a conversation with you.