Joe Hartzler

The funny has been on vacation these past few weeks, and Grief has been doing some temp work for me. On Saturday, June 17, Jake Shook (Shook-Diesal, Blue Team, Zootroy), 21, succumbed to injuries sustained during an automobile accident the week prior. Devastation is one word that comes to mind… also that famous image of the naked girl running from the horror we dropped on Japan a few years back. I feel inclined to strike awesome poses in anticipation of our becoming nuclear shadows. But, I suppose that kind of doom and distraction is too much to hope for. Instead, life will plug along; years and years of mornings on the 405.

Like our friend Gus, buried just over a year ago, Jake was lucid for three days following his accident, and facing paralysis. Unlike Gus, I got to speak with Jake before he died. When I got to him on Tuesday he was lying flat on his back in a hospital room, listening to gadgets hiss and click, and staring at a light on the ceiling. He was also trying, largely unsuccessfully, to cough. Each attempt began with a terrific breath and a furrowed brow, but quickly devolved into a pathetic gurgle.

Still, his wit, humor, and relentless vitality remained unscathed. He told me about the nurse that came in late, how he was sure he had a chance with her. While getting a dose of synthetic hope he asked another nuse if she could “hook-up his boy,” me. “I can’t go out to the bars or anything,” he said, “but after my surgery we’ll kick it Oowld school. You know how we do.” Despite the gravity of his situation, his crippled limbs and shallow breathing, Jake insisted he’d be out of the hospital by Saturday. He was right.

And so it goes. Few will ever know me so well as Jake, and few will make me laugh louder or longer. He will remain a phantom limb for the rest of my days, felt but missing, and his laughter will lace every venture I make. I will always feel the slightest bit guilty and the slightest bit proud, because sometime back the jokes that were Jake’s and those that were mine became indistinguishable, and our personalities blurred at the edges, pouring into one another, until each one of us was twice.