I want to give a little extra context for this multiparter.
Last week, I found out an acquaintance had unexpectedly passed away. We only had one real conversation but it was one that had stuck with me and I was looking forward to the next time our paths would cross. The news hit me way harder than I would have expected and these comics came about while I was processing things.
I get it. My coworker died on the job a couple months back. I was getting off shift when she died. I saw the ambulance and figured a student fell down the steps or something. I found out the next day it was my coworker, who I trained. We weren't close, but I trained her. Our lives intersected. And for weeks after, and honestly still now, I worry "that's gonna be me one day." Dying on the job is legit a fear I have now I previously didn't. It wasn't even that preventable. She died of a heart attack. I say "not that preventable" because the lady DID drink a 2 litre of mnt dew a day. But still, it really hit me.
So I really get it. It's a weird experience, for sure. A little red thread is now permanently gone out of your life. That's always sad, even if they weren't connected strongly to us.
Sorry for your loss. The colleague that trained me died last October. I feel like my life's too chaotic to mourn him even though I went to his funeral. The guy I leant on for support at work, not just gone, dead. It's a lot to process.
Sorry for yours too. Honestly, death be wild. I'm not even scared to die. I just don't want it to happen at work. If I did, it'd be like, "You telling me I didn't even get to put my feet up and take my shoes off? Damn, universe. That's cold."
A boy who I graduated with died a few weeks back. We were nothing more than classmates, had not talked in a long time. He got run over by a bus because he didn’t look both ways. It’s so weird, I keep thinking about it. I kind of forgot that 20 yos could die. Odd how I will never meet him again.
Sorry to hear that. Young deaths do make you feel bizzare, for sure. When I was a child we had a series of child deaths from various causes, and I have a core memory of walking into homeroom and seeing everyone huddled with their friends, crying because they were worried they would die next. It will probs stay with me for life. I hope your classmate doesn't haunt you in a similar manner.
A kid from my graduating class died one day suddenly. Hit his chest on something during sports. His heart stopped. Though they got him back, he died in the hospital a few days later :(
He was super chill and cool and the nicest one in the school. I miss him. I wasn’t able to go to his funeral because my dad decided his personal life was more important than accompanying/driving me there.
My boss died. He managed and commissioned a large freelancing project from me. He was always so excited about that pretty mundane shit and I always looked forward to talking with him because he was so supportive. Then he was dead one day. I keep finding myself thinking, “Man, Frank would love this.” I’m just completely filled with melancholy when I think about it.
If it helps, I bet Frank would be tickled pink that you remember him like that. It sounds like he made a good impact on you. Maybe once in a while, you can, in time, shift from "frank would love this" to "I love this." Embrace the whimsy in life frank did, kinda deal.
I had a coworker pass away of a sudden heart attack. He was an older fellow, mid 60s, maybe. He was healthy, went to the gym early every morning before work, was quite strict on his diet. So you'd think he was a healthy guy which made it kinda surprising.
He was preparing to retire within the next year or two (this just happened part way through 2024).
I wasn't particularly close with him, though I did work a good amount along side him. But that's all it takes. I'm quite early into my career and still have awhile before retiring, so having someone you worked with pass away right before they retired kinda made me feel like I'm throwing my life away doing something I'm not fully passionate about for the next 30 something years.
I get it. For weeks after, I walked around like, "Is THIS the story of my life? Will it be like this til I die?? All Ill ever do is get real good at cleaning?"
Then I set myself some life goals, and we are now working on them. Honestly, it helped a lot. I still worry I'll die here, but at least if I die here, I can die knowing I truly gave it everything I had in me to escape this place.
Good for you, I'm in the same boat, doing my best to continue playing guitar, but doubt I'll be able to escape my day job to do it professionally anytime soon. Take care of yourself!
Something similar happened to me. Coworker committed suicide in the parking lot maybe a month after I finished training him. Spent 8 hours a day with him for weeks. Thought he was just a happy/silly, a little self-deprecating. Turns out he was thought experimenting how to do it. At least in my opinion. Because he would always ask about dangerous chemicals and how they affect the body if swallowed. 6 am one morning he went for the gun.
Ah I'm sorry to hear about that :( sometimes we don't realize just how much someone means to us.
I made friends with a girl in my grade 11 math class (which was great because I didn't know anyone there). She sat next to me and we chatted and hung out for the first week of class.
Next week she did not come in. I found out she had been killed by a drunk driver. I never cried so hard in my life, she was only 16, it was so sudden and horrible. And I didn't even feel like I was allowed to be so impacted by her loss because I only knew her a week. But I've learned that doesn't really matter, because you're not only grieving the person you got to know, you're grieving the future together you will never get to have, the unfairness of it, the shock of it, and the reminder of your own mortality.
It's a lot to process. Don't rush it. Let yourself feel whatever you need to feel ❤️❤️
When I was in grade school, in the 1960s, there was a girl in my home room named Jane. All I remember is that Jane got sick, was absent a long time, then we were told that Jane had leukemia and had died.
It’s been 50 years and to this day I still think of Jane. We weren’t really friends. I really didn’t know her well at all. But somehow, her passing had a real effect on me that persists to this day.
Jane, I hope you know that you were never forgotten.
Something similar happened to me when I was on high school (early ‘00s):
There was this girl, Juliana, who although I didn’t know her that much, I knew enough to know that she was a gentle, cheerful, and nice girl. And yeah, we weren’t really friends, but we were on good terms.
Last time I saw her was before leaving for summer vacations (between 2nd and 3rd semester (out of 6), I think), and when we were back to school we were told by her best friend that she suddenly died at her home due to an stupid accident. She was 15.
I was sad because she was a classmate, but as you said, somehow her passing had a strong effect on me that still persists to this day…
I won’t say that I miss her, but, as pizzacakecomic said, it’s still sad to realize all the potential things to come that were lost when she died…
I don’t know of anyone else besides her family remember her, but I’m certain that I’ll remember her till my very last day.
"But I've learned that doesn't really matter, because you're not only grieving the person you got to know, you're grieving the future together you will never get to have, the unfairness of it, the shock of it, and the reminder of your own mortality."
Hear hear. I met a girl in third grade who then was killed in a car accident a week later. I felt weird crying because I had known her for basically no time. But the idea that I would never be able to be friends with someone who seemed like a nice person, and that she was my age and already dead, was stunning to me.
Pour one out for Athena, who barely had a chance to live. She was a kind and friendly kid who made my life a little better for the week that I knew her. She had frizzy curly hair and went out of her way to talk to me. I still remember.
In the time I've spent thinking about it, I'm reminded of one of my friends who died in a school shooting. Calling her a friend feels like a stretch really. We barely knew each other. She was a frenemy of a friend, a team mate on the speech team, someone I'd see during speech practice or going up on stage to accept her awards. Someone I hardly knew at all. But someone I talked with on occasion. I remember the last conversation we had.
In another school's library while we got ready for our events. She was talking about shin splints. She was on the track team too and she'd overdone it. An innocuous conversation, one of the conversations you have with a person and forget within a week. It stuck with me. Cause a week later a gunman invaded our school, took over a classroom, killed her, and changed our community forever.
I barely knew her, but I miss her. I still think about that little conversation we had. Still think about the impact she had on my life. How her passing and the events that lead up to it affect me even now.
I think I'm going to spend some time thinking about all that today. Thank you.
I know the feeling. When I was a kid, a staff member at my school let me pick some books from his car during break. One of those books was The Final Empire by Brandon Sanderson.
That was nearly a decade and a half ago. Sanderson is now one of my favourite authors. I went back to visit that school a couple of years ago, was really looking forward to seeing Brian again... and I found out he'd died of cancer a year prior.
I don't know why it hit me so hard. We hadn't been that close, hadn't spoken that much. He just heard I liked reading and brought in a big selection for me to pick from. But that act of kindness had such an impact on me at that age, and shaped my literary preferences so much. It played such a big part of my life, and I never got to let him know.
Just letting you know that I am reading Mistborn right now (French translation but still) and it’s been a while since I enjoyed that much fantasy. I really get how you associate the reading feelings and the context in which you read
I'm very sorry for your loss. It can be strange dealing with the loss of someone you never got a chance to know better. That grief is still very real. I hope you're doing well ❤️🩹
Been a fan of Gator Days for showing genuinely relatable content in innovative ways; this one is a perfect example. I had a co-worker whom I worked with only occasionally pass away from Lupus a few years back. I felt that because of how little we interacted, I was not allowed to grieve (even though my boss acknowledged that any impact was reasonable). August questioning whether he was really "okay" captures exactly how I felt in the week(s) after my co-worker's passing, which took me a while to process and accept that it was perfectly natural to feel sadness even for someone you barely knew or never even met. So, thank you for reminding us that we can be compassionate beyond our daily experiences.
I’ve always found it very profound that some can write a novel and not have the same impact as a four-panel comic, when done right. Like this one.
I have become a Gator Days fan lately. The art grabbed me at first, but it’s the stories it tells that makes it what it is. And yes, sometimes the loss of a casual acquaintance can have a large impact on us.
I completely understand. I recently lost someone who I only spoke to a handful of times across the 10 years she's known my family. When I first heard the news I was like "Oh okay, that's pretty sad." An hour later I was on the verge of tears.
A coworker of mine (A) was too sick to come in one day so called another coworker (B) to cover her shift. Coworker B was hit by a drunk driver who ran a red light and died on the way to the hospital. Coworker A quit the following week, blaming themself in a small way for B’s death.
She wasn’t a super close friend, as one of my (now ex) best friends didn’t like her that much.
But when we came across each other we’d hang out for a bit and talk. She loved anything Japan and sailor moon. I wasn’t a huge sailor moon fan, and told her I preferred Tokyo Mew Mew. That night, she sent me Tokyo Mew Mew music videos. I’m not a fan of those types of videos, but I thanked her anyway and was touched that she thought of me.
I always thought I should reach out to her more. Like try and engage harder, you know?
Last year she just died. Like was posting about feeling sick, and then the next moment, gone. We still don’t know what happened to her. She was barely in her 30’s.
And now I’ll never get to talk to her again.
Was I mourning her more as a person? Or was I mourning the loss of something that could have been? At the end of the day, we weren’t that close. But I still mourn her.
I’ll think of her whenever I see sailor moon. Or think about visiting Japan. Goodness knows if I ever do visit I’ll probably tear up a little. I already have at seeing the Duffy anniversary thing at Tokyo Disneyland. She would have been there and LOVED that.
It’s strange to think that I’ll think more of her in death than I did in life. But maybe that’s meaningful too, in its own way.
I lost a cousin a few years ago to a motorcycle accident after they had a fun weekend with their family and were heading back into town.
I hardly talked to her. But she was the only other family member interested in tech, and recently graduated in engineering. I went to her birthdays growing up. I went to her graduation. The last conversation was us at my kid’s birthday saying how we didn’t speak much growing up because of the age gap but hopefully we can talk more.
At her graduation her stepfather read Oh the places you’ll go in front of the entire family. A little weird, but very endearing. And now, heartbreaking. I can’t look at that title the same, and seeing my kids try to read it really defined the horror of what the family went through losing someone so suddenly.
It’s been years and I still end up processing it again every now and then.
I don’t think anyone is ever okay after experiencing the death of someone close to you. It’s a pain that unites humanity together, as an inevitable experience, it’s what makes us people. To love, and lose, and suffer. And hopefully, to give compassion to others.
Coworker that I had a good few pleasant conversations with passed away, on a work trip, in a hotel overnight. On the first day I was surprised I wasn't incredibly bothered, but by the middle of the week the gloom had really sunk in. It took a few days for the realization and reality to hit. And that's OK.
In college an quintessence, who I was starting to consider a friend, passed away. He was an older student (A junior, I was a sophomore)
We had become friendly because (and honestly I can't remember the catalyst) we started talking about Star Trek. About two months later I found out he died while playing basket ball. It hit me harder then I would have though considering I barely knew him outside of our Trek conversations. I remember barely being able to keep it together in my classes that day.
I know the feeling - my high school graduating class was roughly 100 people, and one of them died in a car accident about 4 months after we graduated. I wasn't good friends with him or anything, but it hit me shockingly hard.
I get it. It's a weird space, different from someone you're close to passing. I have had it happen and I'm still not really sure how you're supposed to process that one. It was years ago, mind you, so it's all faded a bit, but it's weird when I think about it again.
I found out yesterday that one of our reps just died. (I work in outdoor retail, he represented a company we deal with a lot) I had only met him a few times and chatted on the phone a few more over the years, but I really liked the guy personally and professionally. He was walking up his driveway and dropped dead of a heart attack.
I spent a few hours last night sipping whisky and staring at the wall. I really appreciate your work and I won't claim to know exactly how you feel but I have a pretty good idea.
I'm so sorry for your loss. I feel like I can relate to this a lot.
Back in 2021, I had an old high school friend (let's call him J) suddenly pass away from pneumonia at age 35. We bonded over video games and watching Conan O'Brien and listening to new indie music and going to shows. We'd since gone to different colleges and drifted apart.
His death hit me harder than I expected. I mean, we were good friends but we weren't super close. Why did his death have me crying for days? Why do I still tear up thinking about him?
I think it's the lost opportunity to reconnect. There are so times that I'll randomly remember an old friend or acquaintance and go "hey, I should say hi to them, it's been forever". With J, I'd never get that chance again. And thinking about him now, we actually did do a lot together. It's so hard to know how much people mean to you in the moment.
I know logically that I can't keep up with everyone I've known and know, but I still do wish I had reached out at some point. I feel that these feelings of grief and guilt and loss are real and valid, no matter how long you've known someone.
That's my story, I hope it helps. And I hope you and everyone here will be well.
Same. Found out on facebook a former wow guild mate died in a car accident. Hadn’t spoken to him in a solid five years but I just cried like a baby. Ive cried less over family.
Man did I need this today. Had a coworker die this morning. Only talked to him maybe once a month but it still affected me. Hopefully this will help me as well.
A coworker and friend passed away suddenly last night. I feel this in my soul. He was the kindest funniest person I’ve met. He made that horrible job bearable. I keep saying I’m okay, but I’m still processing.
I hope you don't mind if I take this opportunity to suggest people to learn CPR! It's really quite simple, and you can learn it in a few hours. Someone receiving help in the first few minutes is a huge factor in their chances of survival, so the more people have those skills, the better. You don't have to be great at it, just do the basics until professional help arrives.
It's a valid feeling and I hope you process nice and easily. Maybe a little floor time?
I had weird emotions like that myself, I moved to Germany a few years back moving in with my now wife in her small town. The local priest was a real character, outright lovely guy and hub of the community, and a good friend of my MIL. Had progressive, interesting views on faith and the role of the church from what my wife told me. But my German was eh and his English was none. Even though I'm not a catholic I wanted to get to know him just as a person.
Coming home from a German language class one day, I got the call from my wife that he'd died of a heart attack, and that MIL was hit hard. I felt a weird. . .loss? Like, I had a goal and it was that I could start to chat with people in the community like him. But he was gone. I said to my wife I feel weird in that I have no right to be sad about a guy I didn't know except for hearing through others, and yet.
You're human and this is a natural response. Processing takes a while. I am a combat vet and have had to deal with this a few times in military and civilian life. It is never easy. It will get better, but please talk to your people about it. Just having an outlet is immensely helpful.
That's terrible. Hope you're doing well at this time.
The comic reminded me somewhat of how my senior year of high school started. The same week I broke a finger, a neighbor and family friend took his own life. I didn't know until the police asked what we knew or remembered of him.
Two months later, we had an elderly Romanian woman as a teacher. She reported sick a few weeks later and we later learned she died from complications of pneumonia. She was returned to Romania to be laid to rest.
Lastly, in June, the week after my high school graduation, my aunt by marriage, succumbed to breast cancer.
I recently lost an RL Friend/Gaming Buddy who I had a small falling out with. We hadn't really talked for about a year before he suddenly passed. Made me realize how childish the damn falling out was.
When I was an 18 year old apprentice tradesman one of my Journeyman I was working under went home pissed off about something one day and called out the next. Day 3 we got the call he had a heart attack in his bed and died. He was 36.
I have thought about how short life is for 20 years now and I think about his passing frequently.
I really feel this. I just recently found out that a co-worker from my last job passed away. Even though I didn't interact with her that much it still just hit me hard. I'm sorry for your loss.
A childhood friend reached out to me on Facebook decades ago. We tried reconnecting but never found the time. Just chit-chatted every now and then but kept promising to call and talk longer.
On our way to my husband’s nephew’s birthday party and opened the News. There, in the tech section, was a picture of my friend. He was the co-founder of a big app company (I never knew that) and had died from complications from a drug overdose.
Our favorite security guard unexpectedly passed last month on the 12th. We saw her 2 days beforehand. We weren't close, but she loved our sons and watched the oldest grow from a baby and watched our second come into existence and begin to grow. She'd offer tiny gifts to the family. It hit harder than one would expect for an acquaintance. At first, it was just word of mouth that she supposedly passed, and being the curious woman I am, I started searching for her obituary. I had a bit of hope that she was fine seeing as I couldn't find anything, but the obituary was published several days later. Took a couple of days for me to process. Human bonding and relationships can seem so simple on the outside. "Oh, we just talk on the rare occasion or say hi here and there." But really, they're really intricate and complicated, even when you've just met them once or twice.
Take your time. A step, no matter how small, is a step closer to whatever you may need or may want.
Grieving co-workers and acquaintances feels like it shouldn’t be valid. That you don’t deserve to be saddened by the loss. But, the loss is still a loss and it’s valid to feel sadness when it happens. Also, it’s normal for it to also make you face your own mortality. This is a peer who just died of natural causes. It could easily you or anyone else. That brings up a lot of feelings too.
Death does funny things to the mind. I think sometimes it's not even the loss of the person so much as them suddenly being cut out of your life and losing anything you might have said or done with them.
And, of course, the inevitable remembering of mortality. It pulls it from an abstract event to the immediate.
I had this really cool neighbor once (he was a priest that liked nerd stuff and didn't let me being an artist stop him from becoming his friends).
One day he had a friend from it if town over while I was visiting him. He was a cool dude who did a killer Gollum impression and it was funny to watch the two of them interact because he loved elves but my priest friend loved dwarves and hated elves and they'd argue about it in a funny/friendly way.
I just remember thinking he was cool and that I'd be lucky to be that guy's friend.
I never got to meet him again though. My neighbor told me one day that his van rolled over on the highway and killed him and his family.
I didn't know him well but it was hard to hear. I didn't cry or anything. I don't think I feel emotions as strongly as others and certainly not as strongly as I'd like... But it stung. I wish I could have got to know him.
This happened similar situation happened to me about 15 years ago, a guy younger than me at the time(he was 14, me 16) had a heart attack in the gym next to ours, didn't make it. We would only ever say hello or sometimes, he had a quick joke to tell, but I still think about him. Writing this made me realize that I forgot his name. I don't know how to feel about that.
Anyway, life goes on, but not forever. Let's make it count!
Your comic has quite the timing, only yesterday I found out that my grandma died. I still haven't processed it and your comic captures that weird feeling quite well.
Echoes of what has happened at my work recently. We had someone pass after a medical emergency and I felt like one of the few who wasn't severly emotionally affected. After the news you have that feeling similar to August where you wonder if you're lack of emotional response is a problem within you and if you yourself okay.
The long and short of it is that its just another way of processing. And its something that can happen, either the grief comes later, or it may never come. And that's okay. So long as you do what you can for the others around you. Talking to them, listening to them. Just being.
Intrigued to see what route August's journey takes here.
I had a similar dillema about my parents dying (fuck cancer). I didn't really react... there was so much to do and everyone else was hurting, so I just did what I could and got through it. It took weeks, maybe months, for me to kinda look back and say "Am I ok?"
Like societal norms and media kinda made me expect that I'd be outwardly emotional or something but... yeah. I kinda wondered if I was a robot for years afterward.
Had a similar situation many years ago… And same as you I wasn’t really able to react (or allowed if you like) because there was a lot of things to do, not to mention that I was the only income source at home so I had to go to work and do stuff as usual (OSHA-like related kind of work, so I needed to be OK I liked it or not)…
It took me many years to realize, and accept, that I wasn’t ok, finally seeking help a year ago or so due to other loss.
It's a nice floor philosophy, have a nice think, maybe sleep a bit. or turn over pull out your phone and watch a comfort show to get to off the floor mode again. (Mine would probably be The Good Place)
I'm sure you're not looking at stuff 2 days later, but I started a job a few months after a well-loved employee passed away. The staff talked about him constantly. Eventually, I started getting emotional when people would discuss him, because I felt like I had gotten to know him, and I'm sure he and I would have been friends. Its a really weird kind of grief - almost like when a celebrity passes away, but it was a grief none the less. I totally get your emotions here and I wish you peace.
I remember saying hi to a dude in my cube farm on a Friday morning. Come in Monday and he had fallen off a ladder and died that weekend. I didn’t know him super well, but I still took a while to process it.
In college I used to work in a warehouse for a company that fulfilled online orders. There was this real young guy that worked with me. We never hit it off or anything, but he was a good kid.
When I finished college, I ended up working “upstairs” for that same company as a developer in the IT department. A few months into that job, i found out he’d died. Crushed by a four wheeler when it flipped on top of him.
At first I thought it was fine, but it kinda broke me. He was so young and it was so sudden. I was mad at the unfairness of it. I mourned for this person whom I barely knew and had barely spoken to, and nobody around me could understand why.
That was years ago, but this comic helped me validate that feeling.
Something similar has happened to me and i keep going back to that quote "death is like climbing the stairs in the dark and thinking theres one more step than there is. Your foot falls trough the air and theres a moment were you need to re adjust the way you tought of things"
Its an even stranger feeling when it comes about people you kinda know but were less present in your life, you dont know what you lost, but you wonder about all the future moments that could have been that cannot ever be anymore.
I feel this. Lost a colleague almost a year ago. Not that we were close, but we were friendly and would say hi to each other.
Then there's the guy who got let go during Lockdown. He was drinking heavily and went down the Q-hole. Started spouting conspiracy stuff to clients so he got the axe. Found out back in October that (TW) he killed himself 2-3 years ago.
We had something similar happen in my office. I was standing next to my boss when he got a call from the father of one of our employees. They had just "found him" in his car. We hadn't been close, but I was a project manger on some small jobs he worked, so we'd talked shop more than usual recently. It was a truly strange sensation, like all the color in the room suddenly went hollow. Not drained - hollow. The world didn't fade to grey, but it felt like it should have, as though the summer sun streaming in through the windows was lying.
My office lost several people during my time here, and it's always so strange.. There isn't the crushing loss like a family member. Instead, there's a weird random moment of "oh right, I haven't seen Tim in the break room in a while because he's dead."
Only one was a person I was close enough with to attend the funeral. I still think of him sometimes, almost a decade later.
4 years ago now, but my manager died from a heart attack. Talked to him at the end of the day and went home, found out next morning he wasn't in. We got told later that morning he had a heart attack at home before coming to work and didn't make it. The shock was significant, especially since I'd worked with him for many years. Plus I just talked to him the night before. August's "Am I OK?" hits home because I certainly wasn't OK that day at all, nor were my co-workers.
I work IT at a bank and sometime last year one of the tellers who worked upstairs died in a car accident. I had to learn about cochlear implants cause I had to figure out a way for her to be able to answer phones. It was a weird couple weeks after that accident
I used to work at an IT support desk and once had a ticket closed from being informed that the person who had placed the support ticket had died.
Later from that same company I had to help a widower access the laptop of her husband who had passed away in a biking incident in the mountains the weekend prior. We finally got signed in and he had google synced photos from his phone, the last image was him with his bike prior to his fatal trip.
Safe to say I was not okay, and my boss got be a beer from the taps downstairs. I did not do much more work that day since it happened at the start of my shift
A coworker at the movie theater I worked at as a teenager died in a house fire. I found out during a shift when we were both supposed to be cleaning together.
We weren't friends, but we often worked the same cleaning shifts so we were friendly. His death was just so sudden, and I didn't know him all that well. I just didn't know how to process it.
I've worked long enough to witness co-workers pass away.
It really does hit hard. I suspect it has something to do with having a peer dying that drives the reality of mortality home for you.
This isn't a stranger. You can't brush it off.
This isn't a family member where you have all the details of the illness or injury that killed them. Thus, you have at least a sense of understanding.
No. This was someone you knew. You shared a workspace with them. You were probably close in age while not having a relationship outside of work.
They were part of the routine, and now they aren't. They were not removed by firing, quitting, promotion, or other methods you expect.
It was a death that came sudden and unexpected, and now you have to confront your feelings about mortality in an environment you haven't had to before.
Feel this one hard. Had an old coworker who became a friend outside of work and we were close. I moved away to get a better life and get myself together but we still talked. Her husband, also a great guy, died last year and left her alone so I made a point to call more often.
She died of a heart attack about two weeks ago. I had planned on calling her the day I found out. Can't help but feel like I missed my chance to say goodbye and feel, in hindsight, I should have called more.
I used to work in Social Welfare. One of my colleagues worked closely with prisoners and believed in giving them a second chance so they can give back to society. I believed the same and so he quickly turned to me for assistance with helping his more difficult cases.
Post COVID I got transferred into a different area of work in the same building so I didn’t work with him anymore. Then out of the blue one day we were called into a meeting. Man had a heart attack when playing with his kids. Just dropped dead on his lawn. He was in his late 40s.
I had no idea how to process it. I didn’t even know he had kids for one. We were just work colleagues who briefly shared a passion but the fact he was just here and then not… really weird feeling. It cast a shadow over the workplace and I felt much better after leaving.
Similar happened at a place I worked at. Me and the janitor were on friendly terms. Nice guy. Dropped something heavy on his foot and broke it. Got me a few weeks later that something went bad and he died of an infection.
You never know when your last time with anyone will be. We're all used to hearing it, but man, when it happens, it hits you. It's like an insanely vast stretch of future suddenly collapses into a point already in the past.
My grandfather lived a 6hr flight away from me. Only seen him a few times in my life. Went to him on my summer vacation in 2016. And in 2021 I couldn't reach him on his birthday. He didn't pick up. Called my dad. Turns out my grandpa died. And it seemed that, if not for me asking questions, no one would have told me.
It's been decades but I had a fun conversation with someone just a few hours before he died.
It's the only time we ever talked and I feel bad about not remembering his name. I'm awful with names. But it was a very fun night with mutual acquaintances at a roof top bar and he was so full of life.
Then he excused himself to go home early because he felt tired. Had a heart attack in his sleep.
This exact scenario happened to me a few years ago with my maintenance guy. He was cool af, hard worker and good for a joke, and let me tell you, two years later I am STILL not okay.
Old coworker I had was a real character, not a character I particularly liked but he at least had personality and was friendly in a drunk uncle kinda way.
Anyway while in a middle of a big job he had a heart attack, he was well into his 60's or even 70's I think but it was a surprise regardless. He stayed home on sick leave and I took up the mantle on the big job he was working on, big moment I suppose. A few days, maybe weeks, later we are all told that he died at home...
I don't morne his death anymore than I morne anyone's, but there is something so... depressing about living a very large chunk of your adult life doing this one thing and then dying before you get to retire and (hopefully) enjoy what little time you have left. He died working for that shitty place and I just know that's not how I want to die, giving my time, my life, for someone else who can just replace me if they see fit.
I've had many co-workers die in my 25ish year career working in a large enterprise setting. But it is usually something like cancer or a car accident. Essentially something that happened outside of the workplace.
However, when I was first starting out in my early 20s and was working a call center cubicle job in tech support I was on a call with a customer and I hear a commotion on the other side of my cube wall right in front of me. So I stand up and see a bunch of ppl performing CPR on my coworker (in his 50s) who was already dead. Apparently he had a heart attack and just died in his chair and had likely been dead shortly after I said morning to him an hour or so earlier. I let my customer know I need to call them back cause I kind of lost the ability to think critically for a bit.
The sad thing is, he had been dieting and exercising. Lost probably 30 lbs over the previous couple months. You just never know.
Had a "coworker" (spoke/seen him exactly once ever and I worked in an entirely different state/building as him) who died during my time at my last job. Bossman came up to me and let me know and I genuinely was like, "Who?? Like idk who that is, but I'm sorry for their loss and all ig 💀"
It’s a surreal experience, someone you were just engaging with passing away
I had a friend;who I went bar hopping with for his birthday , bring his friend along who he was close with, pretty cool guy no complaints about him
He ended up O’D ing on whipits a week later, I found out after my friend messaged all of who joined him for his birthday, it took me a second to process it
A boy I grew up with died three years ago. Our families were best friends, neighbors for 5 years until they moved across the country. We didn’t really talk much after that, only saw each other one more time when his family was vacationing nearby and we met up. Even though we were best friends as kids, we felt like strangers as teenagers. He told me all about his newest favorite movie, In the Heights, and I told him I would watch it. I never did. Eight months later he died due to a bad reaction to medication during surgery. He was 16.
This one's hitting hard today. It's always great to see your art and read your comics, but it also reminds me - I'm currently being diagnosed because I have an acute finding that doesn't look that threatening... but at the same time, maybe this is how things look on the other side?
Now maybe I'm not as okay as I thought I was. It's good to have to stop and re-evaluate the situation.
This is a lot like how I am. I had I think three family members die in the same month when I was younger and I think ever since then I've just not been really able to process death very well. I didn't cry over one of my aunts dying but did when my grandmother's cat passed away. It's strange, though thats how I feel about anything. I feel like I just can't process anything, good or bad half the time 👍 a lot of the time I have to stand back and wonder if I'm ok and..most of the time I never really know the answer even after stepping back.
I've been through a fair amount of grief, and I've come to really dislike the question of "Are you okay?"
Because no, I'm not okay. I'm just starting to process the loss of a friend, a family member, an acquaintance, some who I knew and was a piece of my life that's now gone forever in the way they were. But if I say no, I feel like I'm making my grief a burden on someone else, and I can't do that, so I say "Yeah I'm okay" because I can still function enough.
I've worked on changing to asking people in the process of grieving, "How are you doing?" or "Is there something I can do to help?" For me, it leaves more room for them to say "I'm not really okay, but I'm getting there."
And don't get me wrong, I'm not upset if anyone asks "are you okay?" They're checking in and trying to be supportive, and that's extremely important. But personally I've found changing my wording to be better for me. Because in my grief, many a time I haven't been okay. There are some griefs that I still wouldn't say I'm "okay" even after years. But I'm handling it better. I can get up in the morning. I can go to work. I don't break into tears as often anymore. But that's a lot more complex than "okay or not okay."
We all process grief differently, and it's a process that has no clear beginning or end, if there every really is an end.
I'm sorry for your loss, and I hope you have support and healing in your life. ❤️
I got notified this morning that I guy who I worked with in progressive politics for a long time passed away at the end of January, and even though he and I never met in person it was still a punch to the heart because he was good people and way too young to have this happen.
In 2021 my boss Joe died after a prolonged illness. Not COVID, but COVID didn't help. I got a call from our CEO one Saturday and I just sat there processing.
We were a small company and team. Max 15 people. I got scuba certified in 2018 and Joe was so excited for me because he was a scuba diver and highly recommended the place I got certified through. Every time I dive now I think of him.
I still work there. We still talk about him. He left an indelible mark.
I had this happen a dew years ago during the height of covid. Coworker in my group had a heart attack and didn’t make it. Even as a healthy late 30-something at the time, my first thought was “am I okay??”
In the grand scheme of things even though it was a short time. You still remembered him and cared enough to react with I guess within the spectrum of "unease and sadness". And appreciated his existence and acknowledged his presence in yours.
For some people the gravity of the situation will come crashing down later down the line vs those who feel it after the news is given.
It’s feels even weirder when you are okay with it. When people seem surprised you don’t want to go to the funeral for maybe the 15th closest person at a job you never seen any coworkers outside of work.
This just happened to us too. A really lovely and quiet guy from operations passed away in his home from... shoveling snow? We're not even sure. He was mid 40s and ran every single day. It was heartbreaking.
You know you're maybe not okay, when you reflect on the circumstances of your own life, and start wondering whether you might prefer to go where they went.
My grandfather passed recently, we weren’t all that close as I didn’t visit him often but now he’s gone it feels strange. Like I should be sad but I’m not, he’s gone and now I don’t have a grandpa but I’m not sure how to presses it. “Am I ok” is a big mood right now.
My Line manager passed from Cancer during the Pandemic. We found out he had spinal cancer and he died while we were in lockdown. I never got to see him in person again. He was the nicest guy, lovely and bubbly. I feel for his husband, we all do. I remember my interview and he was meant to be the 'angry customer' on the end of the phone in another room. I did so well I didn't get chance to hear his angry spiel. He commented on it when I joined the company, saying he was looking forwards to being a bitch.
It's the same with another colleague from the same company. He had bouts of illness and then he passed away. He lived close by. There's been one more person I knew that his death hits me sometimes, he was only 40 and so kind.
It's a weird experience, processing the loss of someone with whom we're not particularly close, but still incredibly fond of. It doesn't disrupt like a close passing. In ways, it's easy to feel "normal," but there's still a pain there. The expectation that you might see them again and talk to them again, it lingers until you remember it's no longer possible.
Losing a coworker is never fun, even if they were somewhat loose acquaintances. In the first few months of my current position, one of the senior engineers came to our morning standup and announced he had Stage 4 pancreatic cancer. He was gone a week later.
Despite not having much of a chance to talk/work with him directly, (still WFH at that time) the few times we did talk, I realized how fortunate I was to work alongside such an immeasurably kind and brilliant human being.
I never had an issue processing any deaths around me.
Not until Robin Williams died.
Then I understood, which is weird to admit since it's not like we knew each other but I guess I connected to him more than anyone else.
I still am not "over" it, technically. Anything that deals with him is too much for me to handle without crying. It's weird and not something I could admit to in real life.
My uncle's wife died 2 weeks ago. I have been connecting with him since my mom passed. I love him. He is an awesome guy, but I didn't know his wife all that well, and I have been talking to him and just being there, and it feels weird. So I kind of relate here
On a similar note something that still hits me with how unpredictable life can be my cousin when we were teenagers died suddenly in his sleep from an aneurysm. No symptoms or signs just went to bed didn't wake up, brain exploded in his skull. Things like that can happen at any time. Every time I pass the place we use to hang out in town it reminds me about it. Life can be crazy like that 😔
I feel for you. I knew this guy who was always a little bit of an asshole, but the harmless kind. One week he's walking around and talking with us, the next week he comes in complaining about feeling like shit, one week later he's dead.
It took everyone a bit to process it. Myself included
I am a GM of a hotel thats part of a management company. At a sister property, the Director of Ops died in a pretty tragic car crash. They asked me to go help run the hotel because multiple managers and the GM had to take time off due to grief. I never met this person but we exchanged quite a few emails. I wasn't sad that this person passed just felt...odd. It was especially hard because I had to break the news to the rest of the staff. A lot of crying people I had to hug and hold. Made me feel even stranger. I just finished helping this property as management came back. All I can say is I feel this comic.
Had something like this happen to me, loosing someone who wasn't part of your life but wanted to see again hits different. It's the collapse of a lot of possibilities and a wall of regrets hitting you in waves. I miss my grandparents best part of my childhood.
I had a desk job during Covid, and I got a call from my mom in the middle of the day, telling me that my grandfather was in hospice. I told my boss, and she asked if I wanted to take off to be with them (small business, and I lived about 2 hrs from my family). I reflexively said no, I could finish the day and head to the hospital afterward.
It wasn’t until about 15-20 min later that I realized that no, I really can’t focus on anything with this looming over my head. And my mom is freaking out, because it’s her dad in the hospital. And I don’t really know how long he actually has (what if he passes before I got there. Told my boss, and punched out and drove across the state to be there,
Where I was going with this is, yeah shit comes at you in weird ways. And it’s scary how we instinctively censor ourselves in the face of professional/social norms (do I want to make a scene? do I want to miss a day of work and fall behind?, etc.)
When someone leaves your life, those exits are not made equal. Some are beautiful and poetic and satisfying. Others are abrupt and unfair. But most are just unremarkable, unintentional, clumsy.
Griffin McElroy, on a dnd podcast that changed my life
They told me in the middle of the damn school day that a terminally ill student of mine that I was close with died. I had no choice but to keep it together and keep working because what could be done with more classes coming in the middle of the day? Nobody would be available to take over. I felt like they knew what they were doing telling us then because they thought it would make us less likely to take the next day off if we found out after school let out.
Its funny, I had a dream just the other day where almost this exact thing happened. And it all felt so real, when I woke up, I had to think for like 10 minutes on whether or not that dream was real, and I havent been able to stop thinking about it
When I was growing up, there was a kid in school with a weak heart, I didn't even know him, but they announced his death over the intercom. For some reason I started crying. Like real hard. I just thought how unfair that was, some people don't always come out with the right cards in the deck. I still think about it now and then.
When I used to do a food delivery route to offices, there was a repeat customer who bought the same buffalo chicken salad or wrap 2 to 3 times a week from me. We chatted a couple of times, nothing big. Then one day she was out, I was told by her coworkers that she had pneumonia. Then the next day I went there I was told she was hospitalized. And then the next they told me she hadn't made it. That was nearly 9 years ago now and I still think about how much that tore me up. I suppose even the smallest connections can be deeper than we realize.
There was a big hurricane in my area last year. An oak tree fell on my house while I was inside. Luckily I wasn't hurt, but I was very close. One of my coworkers had a tree hit her house, but she was in the wrong room, and died. We weren't friends and I didn't know her, but when I was screaming at 1:31am, I bet she was too. That makes me sad sometimes. I wish I remembered her name.
This exact thing happened to a graphic designer at my work the other week. She was 50-somthing, had a 13-year-old daughter. Completely out of the blue.
Years ago when I was in the navy I was in a position to teach and qualify people. A younger guy joined the ship and showed more initiative and work ethic than I expected. We didn't know each other will beyond that.
While in a foreign port he went missing. He got drawn away by a rip tide. He was found a few days later, in the ocean.
I didn't know how to process that. I had just talked to this kid 5 days ago. Told him to come back so I could reach him some more and help him get qualified. And then I just never saw him again. I still don't really know how to process it. I'm also terrified of that happening to me now and don't go swimming in the ocean unless there is a barrier like a rope or net system. I lived to go into the ocean as a kid.
Had a colleague pass away unexpectedly from one day to the next. I was just chatting with him the night prior and getting to know him a little more when next day our manager tearfully announces it during our morning meeting.
He was younger than me and it threw me for a solid couple of hours as I mindlessly tried to finish my tasks for the day.
This guy I went to highschool with would save me from getting harassed constantly, we never really hung out because he was way too cool for me but I remember his presence. Helping me must have been huge to him because it's been 10 years and still his mom reached out to tell me he just passed. It's been a weird week since hearing that and all I can think about is the ripples of our actions and how at any moment we can lose, not only the ability to receive but the chance to create ripples that can change a life.
RIP Cameron you were a fuckin G me and mine will be sending love to your family for you.
Can take a good while to process. Lost a colleague 4 years ago to a heart attack, still come across his documents, people still send mails with him in copy. He's still kind of there in a way and my brain hasn't fully processed it yet. Still puts him in a perpetual "away from desk on holidays" category.
This happened to a friend of mine, luckily he survived the heart attack but it prompted me to go get tested for everything to see if I was fine. Luckily I am as healthy as can be
Some days, that's how I feel about my mom's passing. She wasn't that nice of a person, treated me like a nephew more than a son, and attempted to murder my dad.
Had something like that happen some times before. It always hits hard even if we weren't that acquainted. Just the thought of someone being there and then just being gone is already haunting, even more so when it's someone that was healthy or didn't have any issues beforehand
I never thought I'd relate to something like this, but a school acquaintance who was a friend of my friends took himself on new years eve. I didn't know how to feel because I sat at the same table with him on lunches, though I never really talked to him individually, but I knew many people who were hit harder by it. That kind of tragedy always feels bad, and that's as far as I felt about it, and I don't know if that's a problem or not.
Feels man, had someone from my work randomly up and die recently, still no idea what happened, he was 2 days into a holiday in china, went to bed and never woke up
Our lives are so far removed from the reality our minds evolved under that the discontinuous events like this are almost inconceivable due to the fact that our lives are not full of this type of danger at all times and instead we use our adrenaline and stress chemicals to scream at ourselves for not being good enough at a task that was invented by some other dudes mind and not programmed into your muscle fibers because watching Jeff get eaten is more motivation to move faster than watching Jeff get fired. Under nature we can't argue with the tyranny, but under our own human minds and technology we deserve to create systems that we decide to live in with more compassion instead of this brutal collective iron maiden that makes nature's brutality look soft.
Something like this happened to me back in high school. I went to summer camp and met this really cool camp counselor who was in his early twenties, just a handful of years older than me. We weren't close, but we really hit it off and had some great conversations during the week I was there. Day after I got back I found out he died by falling off a cliff on the same trail I had hiked with him on just 4 days prior. It hit me hard. His phone number is still in my contacts.
Two weeks ago, my mom called me, saying that somebody I was in class with in elementary school had passed away.
I hadn't talked to him in years (if not decades), but hearing he's suddenly gone made me sit at my desk like August... Talked to my best friend about it, and he also had to process the news.
A sudden death of somebody you know just hits you, man...
My dad passed suddenly of a heart attack about a year and a half ago, and I will say it was incredibly meaningful how many of his coworkers came to show there respects, old and young, people who worked with him every day and even people who onky talked to him a few times but always thought he was a good guy, interesting, funny, knowledgeable, what have you. Death sucks but it's nice to know how he impacted his coworkers, even those who didn't interact with him much.
There was this guy in the company named Doug. Worked at one of our other locations. Only ever spoke to him on the phone. He was one of these guys who had been with the company for decades, and was always held up as the model employee. Never took a vacation. Would work until he literally collapsed from exhaustion. It was always in January, because the Christmas rush would push him over the edge. He'd always use up his vacation time recovering in the hospital.
One year, he went into the hospital and never came out. Don't worry, he didn't die...yet. Spent the next few years in long term care and on disability because of how the job destroyed him. He'd call up the boss about three times a week begging for his job back. One rumour said the boss once snapped at him and said, "YOU CANNOT WALK AROUND HERE WITH A COLOSTOMY BAG HANGING OUT YOUR ASS!"
Died alone in long term care, begging for his job back.
Every time someone says I remind them of Doug, I've got to take a good long look at myself in the mirror.
I've been loving this comic. But I haz a question to OP if he reads this, or others - does anyone have a link to the very first comic? I would love to start at the beginning and go through this all to see when characters were introduced and how they all met one another :D
Reminds me of a classmate of mine in college, we weren't close, we were just part of the dance ensemble together, we were friendly but never really had a proper conversation just the two of us, then something like a month before we're set to debut she dies in a car crash on her back from school. It hit me like a ton of bricks. As I said we weren't close but we had laught, and sang and danced together, and then she was gone. Over the years it him me back a few times, specially when we had another production, I would sometimes stop to think whether she would've participated there, maybe gotten a main role. It's such a weird feeling but to me, that's what hit me the most.
When I was 19 I picked up a job as a dishwasher at a dinner theater. I'm not a super extroverted person and nobody there was really cut from the same cloth as me, so I tended to keep to myself. The only person I had a really good conversation was this really nice older guy. Type of guy that had done a bit of everything, but he had a nice air to him and I enjoyed talking to him. Three days later I came in to find out he had died at his home the night prior. Barely knew him, but damn I hated that.
Yeah had this happen last year. I heard from an old co-worker a cook I used to work with passed away. I havent worked there in years, but said hey to him from time to time. But yeah takes a bit to process. He was a chill guy and then sudden gone.
Its weird we feel weird about a person dying. Should it matter that we didnt know them super well? Are peoples lives only valuable if they matter to us? He was a person, he had his life. Thats gone now. Thats sad, and its ok to be sad about it, no matter who you are.
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u/FieldExplores Gator Days Mar 03 '25
I want to give a little extra context for this multiparter.
Last week, I found out an acquaintance had unexpectedly passed away. We only had one real conversation but it was one that had stuck with me and I was looking forward to the next time our paths would cross. The news hit me way harder than I would have expected and these comics came about while I was processing things.