Cole Swanson, the loss of a friend ends college career
by Ian Melewski
edited by Dina Martucci
He doesn’t know much, all he knows someone who he was close to is now dead. Cole threw on his jacket and shoes and went for the door. His girlfriend Skyler was not far behind. Cole headed back for Hinsdale, New Hampshire.
Cole hurried into his house to see Trace Kirkwood his best friend, waiting for him and in tears. Trace said that their close friend Matthew Snyder, only 18 years old was dead at the scene of a car accident just a few miles down the road from Cole’s house. His death was immediate. Skyler broke down and was crippled by tears, she sat down by Trace. Cole stood motionless on the recently cleaned linoleum in his kitchen, and in complete shock. Like he was trapped inside a painting, Cole was unable to register what he heard. It couldn’t be true.
He was once an honors student, someone who would get up at 6:00a.m. for an 8:00a.m. class, now laid in bed and scrolled through his phone, missing all of his classes on a frigid February day.
“It’s not that I made the decision I wasn’t going to class, it was the fact that I just lost all motivation, that drive I had before was gone, I didn’t really care anymore”, Cole said. His grades slipped, a year after Matt died, Cole was still unable to push himself along. He would make up excuses, come up with some reason not to go, but the reality was he was still in the same shock he had when he first heard the news. Cole logged onto Campusweb ready to pick classes for the upcoming semester he took a peek at his GPA: 1.9., far from his 3.8 he had during his Freshman year.
Cole packed up his belongings, took one last look into the room, and closed the door behind him. Cole headed back to Hinsdale a month before the semester ended. “The laziness took over, I was done” Cole said. His time at Franklin Pierce University was over.
Even several months after leaving school, Cole continued to stay at home, not working, and nearly 40 pounds heavier. But Cole got his chance to get a new job through a family friend, and the motivation he had his freshman year slowly started to return
“At a certain point I just said to myself ‘enough’ I had to do something”, Cole said. Two months later he got a new job at a car dealership. It took him almost half a year after leaving Franklin Pierce, but Cole found himself improving his overall life. Cole was making a stable income, losing the weight he put on, and getting engaged to his girlfriend.
Cole threw on his coat, kissed his wife to be, and headed into work, where he was leading his sales department at his dealership. He won’t get his friend back, but he found his ability to care about things that matter.
