"Death is not the greatest loss in life. The greatest loss is what dies inside us while we live."

Eighteen years ago today, I was working at a large metro newspaper in advertising. There were six of us on staff in automotive display, and we were all very close. Shelly sat next to me and, when we weren't out selling, we were laughing and having fun while we put together our ads. She and I would also go to lunch or parties, although she was younger than me. She had a wonderful joy of life that you rarely find in people. She was genuinely 'glad to be in the room,' as the expression goes.

That evening she was working on a hard project that was due the next day. She didn't ask for help, but I should have offered. And it will always upset me that I didn't stay that night. We always worked late back then, and I had two children to get to. And none of the bosses asked to help her either... But I should've stayed...

The next morning I got to work, and they called an immediate meeting. I said, "We have to wait for Shelly!" but they herded us into the conference room. She had been in a wreck the night before and didn't make it, they said... She had gone to eat (Taipei, her favorite restaurant) after she left the paper with a friend, and had too many glasses of wine. She stopped by her boyfriend's house, very upset, and he saw that she was too tipsy, and took her keys. When he went in the other room, she grabbed them and left on her short drive home. She evidently rounded a corner and hit a telephone pole smack on. They said at the hospital, that she was hemorraging, and she was set aside to die. I'll still never understand that. She was only 24 years old in perfect health. Why wouldn't they try to save her? I've always suspected that it was to harvest her organs, but... anyway, she's gone. And it's been 18 years... I think about her often. Her life cut short. Her father had walked away from her, her sister and her mother when she was about 10, and they had finally talked right before she died. At the funeral, her father was wailing. Not crying, wailing. I'll never forget how sad that was. And I'll never forget her laugh. And I'll always regret not helping her that night. Because it haunts me still...