While I was no longer friends with him for the last year of his life, I am extremely saddened to hear of Ricky Garduno’s passing today. We’ve been through a lot together, and he and I were very close for a long time. And while he cared deeply for me, his friends, family, and everyone close to him, he didn’t always know how to express it. He would end up pushing a lot of us away when he should have been asking for help. Because of the falling out between me and him, I have avoided seeing and writing to him the last year. And I regret it. I wish he could’ve gotten the help that he needed, and I wish I could’ve been one of the people to give it to him. We all can only begin to imagine how hard his depression and emotional problems were for him. But we can at least know now that he can rest in peace, and I will always look back on the great times we had together. Whether it was going out to dinner and drawing Kimbo doodles back and forth for each other, drunk bowling at Pickwick Lanes, or oogling at a Nazi-clad Scarlett Johansson together while watching the horrible movie The Spirit, I am very happy to have had him as a part of my life. RIP Ricky.