Every once in a while our own mortality is brought uncomfortably close to the surface. Sometimes it is from a loved one passing away, but more often it is from someone we know with whom we have a lot in common dying unexpectedly. You can’t help but think that it could have been you. And sometimes – just sometimes – it is from a completely unexpected source. I had just such an experience last night.

I’ve been going to a digital photography competition site called dpchallenge for several years (my profile is here). It is unlike any site I’ve ever been involved with in that it has the strongest sense of community of any virtual group I’ve seen. I’ve seen the group come together and collect donations to finance a cross country trip for a member whole adult daughter was in the hospital on the opposite coast. I’ve seen them start an impromptu contest with an entry fee (there normally is none) with all the proceeds going to replace a camera that had been stolen from one of the members. I’ve seen members pool frequent flier miles to get a mother who was in bad financial shape to her daughter’s wedding. There have been many other similar instances. In every case more funds were raised than was needed. It is just that tight of a group.

Life has been busy for the last several months so I’ve not been on there much before last night, so it was with much sadness that I learned one of the members had died unexpectedly. His name was Sean Matos and he went by JawnyRico on the site. He was an amazing photographer but, more importantly, a great guy. I was caught by an unexpected wave of emotion on reading that he’d died. It was made worse by the fact that he was only 27.

I’m not sure why it affected me as strongly it did because I didn’t know him personally. I really only knew about him from discussion threads in which he has participated and photos he has entered in various contests but I had seen enough to know that he was a good guy and was well liked. So I went on to read the thread discussing his passing. The outpouring of grief from people who had never met him in person was touching and was frankly getting to me when a post stopped me cold. His wife, who wasn’t involved in the site, logged into his account and posted to the thread. Even in her obvious grief she’d taken the time to come there to thank everyone for their support and condolences. It was touching beyond words. Here is her post:

This is Melissa, Sean’s wife. Wow. I am so amazed to see what all of you thought of his beautiful photographs. I always knew how talented and special Sean was, and how his gifts could touch people’s lives. It truly takes my breath away to see how much he meant to so many of you. The latest challenge “The Cowboy” being in honor of my husband, means so much to me. He loved photography. It was such a passion of his. We spent hours together working on these photos and traveling to different places to take them. I will miss that. Thank you so much for all your love and support through this time. It is a huge loss in my life. The love of my life, and my forever best friend is no longer here. I pray that I get through this with the support of my family here and the wonderful support from all of you. Thank you so much for helping Sean and honoring him now.

I love you all!!

I went from choked up to tearful then I read on. As the thread unfolded the site admins made his profile a permanent page as a memorial and his wife returned to say that she was taking up photography as her way of staying connected with her late husband. She created her own profile and for a user name chose “Luvagirl”, a nickname her husband had given her back when they were just dating which was evidently when they were 15 or 16. I’m can’t find the words to express how moved I was. I then went to his profile page to look at some of his work. I’d always liked his stuff but hadn’t really looked at it as a single body of work before. Before I ever got to the photos I made the mistake of reading his profile. In part it read:

Love two things, my wife Melissa, and photography. Found this site and it rocks with all the talent, info, learning, and incredible photographers of all types. Hope to learn lots with editing and improving my people shots. Always remember to never take life to seriously, nobody gets out alive anyway. Thanks for stopping by, and we hope you shop with us again soon.

Signature – Last night I lay in bed looking up at the stars in the sky and I thought to myself, where the heck is the ceiling.

How prophetic and how terribly sad. I was far from together after reading all of that but then I noticed the user status on the profile. Every profile shows the same line but I never thought much about it until this time. It read:

Status: User is currently offline

I don’t ever recall something so innocuous eliciting the emotional reaction that single line did. It connected with me somewhere deep within and left me completely wrung out. I feel more like I’ve lost a family member than someone I knew of online. And I keep thinking that, but by the grace of God that could be me. As I sit here in need of a tissue I find that I cannot fathom what his wife must have had to endure. My heart goes out to her. I’ve included a few of his pictures below as my own little tribute to him but it hardly seems enough. Perhaps the bigger tribute is in taking his advice: never take life to seriously, nobody gets out alive anyway.

/g

Click on the images to see the originals complete with his commentary.

The title of this shot is “Forever Best Friends”. The same term his wife used to describe their relationship. How poignant.