How can one day????

How can one day be filled with so much hurt, frustration and loss.... Today I am low, down and wounded....

Yesterday was one of the roughest days I have had so far working with YouthBuild. From the moment I walked in the door to start my day, it was dramatic.... It continued throughout the day and I was unable to even get home until 7:10pm....Pissing and moaning the whole way, complaining about my day, bitter at the drama that took place....

Then the Universe spoke to me and showed me how silly, petty and stupid all this drama I had been struggling with was.

As I pulled into my driveway, bottle of wine in my hand, ready to numb the day away, my cell phone alerted me that I had a message from my old friend, Kenneth. I listened to the message and he said...

"Brad, call me back ASAP!"

I knew immediately something was going on because Kenneth never calls me like that for nothing....Something has happened.... I braced myself, took a deep breath and called him back thinking, "How can this day get any worse!"

And the Universe spoke to me again and said...."This is how"

Kenneth answered the phone and I said...

"Whats up?"

"Marty Ermis just shot himself and he is dead!"

My immediate response was ...

"No way dude, you have to be kidding me!?"

Like he would kid about something like this....I was immediately in shock!

"I don't know the details, but all I know is that it has been confirmed that he shot himself and he is dead"

And I was absolutely stunned...Speechless....Just stepped outside of my body....Reality just became foggy and surreal...This cant be true!

Now Marty and I have not spoken for some years now...Maybe once since I left the Sheriffs Department....But for my first 1 1/2 years as a rookie on the streets with the Galveston County Sheriffs Department, Marty was my partner.

Through that time and for many years after, we stayed pretty good friends. He had a BBQ team and did cookoffs, and I was at MANY of those....We had many nights in bars, getting drunk, at parties, celebrating and just kicking up our heels, and he and his friends became part of my family...So much so, that when I was out of town on hunting trips or whatever, Donna was with him and "the crew" at the Galveston County Fair, some other cookoff, some bar...He was always there to make sure Donna was OK and safe....I trusted Marty with not just my life, with the lives of my family.... I don't know that I can recall any cop I ever met that had the heart, the humor and the charisma that Marty did....EVERYONE LOVED HIM!!

I can clearly remember a day I was driving down Hwy 87 in Crystal Beach and noticed 3-4 cars stopped and Marty's unit in the middle of the road with his lights on and wondering

"WHAT THE HELL is going on??"

Only to drive up and see Marty had stopped traffic, was in the middle of the highway and was picking up a turtle to get him out of the road so he wouldn't get run over.....His heart was TRULY bigger than you could imagine!

I still, to this day, tell stories about the times we had together on the streets.

There was an incident that kind of defined my Law Enforcement experience when I was forced to shoot an escaped African Lioness (HORRIBLE experience).... When that all went down, I was with Marty.....

There are so many other incident I could refer to, but he was there, present and witness to THE moment that followed me through my Law Enforcement career and even follows me to this day....It was me, and him that night, on that highway, in Crystal Beach.

I remember I was this young rookie, ITCHING to get out on the streets, working these quiet nights on Crystal Beach, listening to the radio of the police departments and Sheriffs Deputies who were patrolling the mainland in pursuits and chasing bad guys, and taking all kinds of calls....I would sit on the beach and just ACHE to be up there in THE SHIT!!

One night, I was sitting on the beach, watching the waves crash on the shore, not a soul to be seen for miles, sky without a cloud in it, full of stars and a bright, glowing moon, and just sitting back listening to the radio chatter.

Marty pulled up alongside of my unit and we were sitting what we called "69" in our patrol cars...His car pointing towards Galveston, my car pointing towards Louisiana, drivers side widows side by side....

Marty ALWAYS wore a ballcap and ALWAYS had a cigarette hanging out of the side of his mouth....

As he pulled up to me this night, I rolled down my window and Marty started to talk...

The funny thing about Marty is he was never in a hurry with his words....Its like he actually paused and thought about every word before he said it.... So as I rolled my window down, and he rolled his down, he inhaled on that cigarette, exhaled with a big gasp and said....

"Well Junior.....I wonder what the REAL police are doing tonight!"

I took a second to take in what he said and then realized....

Here we were, sitting on a beach, on a beautiful night, waves crashing in front of us, full moon bright in the sky, GETTING PAID to do it.....While the radio chattered with other Police Officers and Deputies running their asses off, getting case numbers and doing reports....

Marty was always able to remind me what the GREAT things.....the PRIVILEGE it was to be in that uniform and in that unit....... No matter how much I wanted to be "in the shit" he was always able to remind me that being a cop wasn't JUST about that!! He was a great mentor and a teacher.

I could go on and on about the stories about Marty, and maybe I will someday, but I can still see it clearly in my mind.... That short little Deputy, getting out of his unit, hiking up his belt, walking up to any scene I was on or to just go eat dinner (where he would ALWAYS get a cheeseburger with jalapenos and eat it with a fork and knife...EVERY SINGLE DAY!) and saying.....

"So what-cha got Junior?"

It is a sad day for my family and the Sheriffs Office family.... I am not sure of the exact amount of time that Marty had in Law Enforcement but I know it had to be close to +/-30 years.

He had two children he loved dearly and for whatever reason, he found that the life he had was no longer manageable..... Some people see this type of act as a selfish thing....I don't!

I have worked with people long enough, and had enough loss like this close to me to understand that whatever was going on in their life, wherever they were in their life, it was so bad, it was so defining, it was so hard, that the only way to WIN in the situation is to take yourself OUT of the situation....And I have NO JUDGEMENTS, because THAT experience is one I have been VERY close to......

I remember a saying that sticks with me in this moment.....

"Don't ever judge the path of another, because there is no way to understand their journey or their struggles."

The Universe has a weird way of "showing up"..... I just recently said, "I don't EVER want to go back to Galveston County." and now, the Universe is showing me that I am going back to Galveston County soon....

Gods Speed Marty Ermis..... I will remember you for as long as I breathe.... YOU made my life more fun, more impacting, more clear, more simple....You made my life RICHER by just being a part of it! May we see each other again someday!