Ryan effected me deeply and whole-heartedly.

Adam (Ryan's brother) is my best friend in the world. We are both from Cleveland and live in New York now (even though we never knew each other in Ohio). Last summer, Adam and I both had to come home to Cleveland to go to weddings. One night, around midnight or so, I called Adam and asked him what he was up to. He told me he was at the Winking Lizard in Lakewood with his brother and sister. He wanted me to come by and meet them finally. I had heard so much about Ryan and Allison from Adam and I was excited to meet them. When I got there, I met the two of them. I sat down next to Ryan after shaking his hand and said, " you and Adam look so much alike!" He responded with the prize-winning remark of, "yeah, it's crazy how when you have the same parents, if they have a couple of kids, they tend to look the same...something called genetics or something, I'm not sure..." And when he looked at me a laughed so hard, because I knew that in the same way that I was so instantly close to Adam when we met, that I was going to feel comfortable with Ryan as well. We ended up at a friends' house, talking untill the sun was coming up. We laughed about sports, politics, cartoons, the McDonalds characters (Mayor McCrack, The Snuff Burgalur...). I remember the birds starting to chirp and thinking, "wow, I havn't laughed this much or had such intelligent conversations in a really long time." I offered him a place to sleep for the night, instead of having to take a taxi back to his hotel. When I had come back from finding him a blanket, he was fumbling with the VCR. He was trying to get it to work so that he could watch either The Care Bears Movie or Alice In Wonderland, he couldn't decide which! He asked if I would watch it with him, and we decided on Alice In Wonderland. We proceded to have a conversation about how the Walrus and The Carpenter are such obvious metophores for Buddah (and eastern religion in general,) and Jesus Christ (and western religions.) I remember him as one of the smartest people I'd ever had thet pleasure of spending time with. I remember him as one of the funniest people I'd ever had the opportunity of spending time with. I've not had a day go by when I didn't think of Ryan since that time I spent with him. It may have been a fraction of the time most people had, but, it will never leave me. Ryan Klesh effected me. Ryan effected me deeply and whole-heartedly. I can't deny that. After I spent a long, sad night with Adam after we learned what happened, I decided I had to do something in his honor. On Monday, April 17th, just a few days after his death, I tatooed my wrist for him. It's something that he and I shared that night, that day, all of those e-mails between us over that last year. and I have it there, forever on my skin as a reminder that there are amazing people in the world. People who can lift and illicit feelings that even the hardest of hearts can't push aside. I waited, biting my nails for the day that I could see Ryan again, to come to New York, finally, and see the city and his little brother, and maybe share a little bit more time. Instead I'll have to wait much longer to see him again, and when I do, I hope he'll be there, open arms, that full smile, with that little gap in between his two front teeth. And I hope he'll greet me by saying, "it was the carpenter, wasn't it?"