I have never met him before but I have heard about him since I have known my best friend.

He was a Korean. His image in my head is from his artworks like his drawing, writing, photography and a website he created. There are not too many people who I am impressed about their talents. He is one of them.

The website he created in 2000 was ahead of time. It was like those blogs that are in craze right now. He wrote about his own life, pictures he took, movies and so on. He raised thousands of dollars through his website to help the Walk for Hunger Project in Boston.

He was a struggling artist who, for all of his life, felt like a black sheep in his family. He lived in his older brother’s shadow. While his brother, an architect, was a family’s dream who walked his life as his parent wanted, his great love with arts was shunned by his parent.

He became a stranger in his own family.

However, he tried to turn his grief into a source of creativity; his dreams to talents; and his hardship to help other people.

However, life is tough. To overcome those obstacles and reach our dreams are even tougher.

He decided to take his own life three years ago when he was 23 years old.

My best friend has kept all of his ex’s art works for 3 years. However, he is moving far away. It is time for him to place his ex’s life in his memories instead of carrying around those artworks. It is hard for him to go through his ex’s artworks. Every piece of them has a story, a story that pierces my friend’s memories. So, I volunteer to go through those artworks.

The more I see those artworks, the more I admire him. He was so young but he was so talented. While I am going through those works, I am sad for the fact that if he just held on for a moment, everything would change. I am sure he would be a great artist in the future.

But life is like a story. We are the one who write it, change it or erase it. I believe we all have our own reasons to decide to do something. Nothing is right or wrong.

I keep some of his artworks even though I don’t know him in person.

Tae Athikomvittaya