The youth pastor’s wife invited all the girls to an unnamed event. We were told to show up in a formal dress and to bring our moms. So, I did. I thought it was maybe going to be some sort of cute dance thing for the other girls since many of them were homeschooled… however, it became quickly apparent that a dance was not what was happening. They led us away from our moms and made us watch a movie about purity, and then told us that we needed to make a commitment of purity with Jesus.

I’m not writing about music in this one per se. I’m writing about the recent suicide of my good friend Nathan, who just so happened to be a preternaturally talented musician.

To be fair, most of my close relationships with people have something to do with music. But Nate and I shared the experience of being drummers in our respective high school bands. (Spoiler alert: I was good and he was WAY better than me.)