It’s been nine years...

I remember being 25 and directionless. I was bartending and waiting tables in Hollywood at the time. My supposed goal was to be an actor but I didn’t have the drive, discipline or knowledge about how business and marketing works to make it happen. And let’s be honest, I was a shitty actor too.

But I loved acting class. It was such a world away from what I’d done before. Playing make believe, especially doing scenes from movies I’d seen, was intoxicating. The class was intense and energetic. We’d go until everyone had done at least one scene. Sometimes I’d do three scenes in one class. Class would often run for over six hours until past midnight.

I saw people laugh, cry, fight, yell, scream and break down on that stage. It’s always interesting to see how people deal with real criticism on how they come across to the world. It’s one of the hardest things to hear and everyone argues with it, which is funny, because you’re the last person qualified to tell other people how they see you.

As much as I soon realized that acting was not how I was going to make my mark in the world, I’ll always respect it and understand why people want to do it. Yes there’s an ego component and the desire to be the center of attention. But there’s something completely alluring about being so exposed in front of people and learning about who you really are. My teacher always used to say that the camera doesn’t lie.

Many people would start and think that things were easy. My instructor would never go hard on someone the first time. But very quickly people would start to realize where they stood and most of them would quit. Because once things got personal, where someone had to face the way they deal with the world and maybe that they’re not that funny, or cool or nice or whatever it is they convince themselves they are, they’d quit.

But there was a core group of us that stuck it out. We watched each person fight and struggle and want to quit but for some reason keep coming. Everyone had to meet and fight their own bullshit in a way many people would never think of or want to do. We became a tight group and tighter still as we saw more people come and go.

Well one day in walks this guy named T’ai Merion. He was this nice, humble, very funny guy in an interesting, manic way. For some reason we knew this guy was going to stick around and everyone liked him immediately.

At this point I’d been in the class for over a year and had never missed a class. T’ai and I quickly became class clowns together. Our instructor even had to separate us half the time, which just made things worse as we’d both do everything to out mime the other guy into laughing. It was tough as he was pretty damn funny.

He had some great quirks. His parents were hippies in a sincere sort of way so he’d been raised as a vegetarian. At 26, T’ai had never had meat, but unlike most vegetarians, especially in LA, he never made a big deal about it. In fact I had to ask him as I finally noticed that when we went out he never ate meat. And when we went out, it was usually for breakfast food, so he’d always bring his own container of real maple syrup. I’ll always remember that tan plastic container on the table wherever we went. That was T’ai. He liked what he liked and was good about getting it without seeming pretentious or anything like that. It was sincere and that was the difference.
And while T’ai was kind, he was still tough, but didn’t need to show it. He was the captain of his swim team in high school and college. But he didn’t seem like an athlete in the sense of ones I’d met. He wasn’t competitive, didn’t talk about working out and probably never would have talked about the swimming if I hadn’t asked.

After a while of sitting apart in class, we’d developed our own sign language. Our favorite thing was crossing our forearms in an “x” and mouthing “suckle it!”. I have no idea how we came up with that or what it meant but it still makes me laugh as I’m typing this.

We also had a game I’ll call “molest the magazine” that we’d play where we’d pretend to grope the pretty girls in a magazine while adding obscene facial gestures. We each brought our own magazine and would play this silently from across the room. He was always funnier, so I always got yelled at for laughing while he’d suddenly pretend to be listening intently.

Often times after class our core group would go to eat at Swingers Café in Santa Monica. I remember one night in particular because it was so unmemorable. We all ate and laughed and there was T’ai at the center of it all with his maple syrup on the table. It had been a good night at class and everyone had done well. There was just a good festive energy to everyone. Finally we said our goodbyes and headed our separate ways. I remember saying goodbye to T’ai but not shaking his hand or doing the man hug. Again, it was an unmemorable moment.

The next class my friend Ric came up to me in a panic. He hadn’t heard from T’ai and they were supposed to have met for lunch that day. T’ai didn’t flake on people so it did seem strange but I remember thinking that Ric was being dramatic. I decided to call T’ai and leave him a message, giving him some shit about flaking. The phone rang and the machine picked up with his warm, funny voice. But as I tried to leave a message but the mailbox was full. A cold chill went down my spine as I tried to play it off and shrug in front of Ric. But I was worried.

Well soon enough it turned out our worrying was warranted: T’ai had been in an accident in a pool by his house and was in a coma. The lifeguards on duty had tried to revive him but were unable to and he’d been taken to a local hospital.

Many of us came to the hospital to see him and within a day his parents and sister were there as well. I remember him there on the bed with the breathing device stuck in his mouth. He just looked like he was asleep and even in that state I could swear there was an ironic smirk on his face. Only T’ai could appreciate the irony of a swim team captain drowning in a pool in the middle of the day with three lifeguards on duty. No one really knows what happened but apparently he was doing some breathing exercises and the next thing the lifeguards knew, he was floating face first in the water.

For days we’d all come and visit him. I’d talk to him, saying I wasn’t gonna say anything cheesy because I knew he could hear me and would make fun of me when he woke up. I’ve never felt such powerless frustration at seeing someone who seemed so alive and yet wasn’t. His hands were warm and his face looked peaceful. I just wanted to shout and tell him to quit fucking around because everyone was worried about him and the joke was over.

After several days his family got test results from the doctor: T’ai had suffered irreversible brain damage and would only live if they kept him on the ventilator. They decided that this vibrant 26-year-old man who everyone loved wouldn’t want people sitting over his bed, worrying about him for the next 20 years. He was far too kind to want to do that to anyone.

I got to the hospital shortly after they stopped the machine. From outside the room, I remember the silence, then the sound of gasping for life and finally the soft tears of his family. That core group from the class left in solemn silence.

They say that the show must go on, but for us, it never really did. That class was never the same after that. It wasn’t my instructor’s fault, but what we’d become as a class was suddenly gone.
We tried to keep it going, but people slowly drifted apart. We no longer ate together and hung out outside of class. New people started to filter in and the core group started dropping out one by one. Very few of us ever pursued acting after that. I lasted another year or so before I realized it just wasn’t in the cards for me either.

Every year around this time, I think about T’ai. I don’t remember the exact day, but I know it was in May when he died. I’ve seen great things happen to great people. I’ve seen others get exactly what they deserved. And most of the time things are somewhere in between. But I’ve never seen something so fundamentally unfair as that young man in that hospital bed breathing from a machine. I’ve never met such an entertaining, generous and kind soul before or since.

I’ll never regret failing at acting. I’d never change that. But I wish my friend was still alive. I think about all the cool, funny, horrible, excellent and awful things that have happened over the last nine years and can’t help but feel how cheated he was to not get to experience some of them.

And I always feel sorry for people who didn’t get to meet T’ai Merion.

RIP my brother.