RIP Ash Turner
Ash Turner was a young STi driver and photographer (for Hooniverse and a few other outlets) whose work had attracted a lot of positive attention in the past year or so. I never met him, but I had heard about him from friends.
On the morning of May 5, he chose to take his own life.
This is the video he left to explain his choice.
Most of the creative people I've known in my life have struggled with suicidal thoughts. Most of them (most of us, I should truly say) imagine a sort of Tom Sawyer Syndrome situation where they will be able to see the regrets of their friends and family after their death. It's a seductive and destructive thought. Let it go. It's better to live, no matter what.
I don't know why Ash wanted everyone to see this video. I don't know what happened between him and his girl. The forty-two-year-old man writing this wants to tell him that it's all fixable in the long run and even if it isn't, there's always someone else. But I remember feeling the same way about someone a long time ago. Maybe not even that long ago.
Regardless, he wanted people to see this, and he wanted them to see it badly enough to take his own life.
So here it is.