Sunshine Of Her Love
Sarah Anne Whitlock 1982-2006
by Shelton Hull
A very good friend of mine has left this world prematurely, and her loss is, to me and many others, the story of the century. Nothing I’ve ever experienced has hurt me as deeply and irrevocably as the death of Sarah Whitlock, aged 23. She was born in Miami to a couple of physical therapists whose love for the healing arts was the primary influence in her short, beautiful life. For her the choice to make her future career as a nurse was the logical extension of her deeply-set Catholic beliefs, beliefs she proudly advocated while doing things like yoga and, on occasion, voting Republican.
She was a daughter, a sister, a friend and trusted ally to people from all walks of life. I know her only as my girlfriend, my sounding-board, my conscience. She was a key part of the process whose results you read in this space each Tuesday. Her code-name was “Sunshine,” because only direct exposure to sunlight could warm me like a second of her smile. I would give all I have and all I ever will have for just one more hour to bask in the radiance of her glow – a glow of goodness, unfiltered. I never thought I would fall in love again – in fact, I specifically avoided it – but she made it happen. I loved her so much that I introduced her to Alan Justiss! And they got along! We recently heard about first loves, but Sarah is my last. I will hold onto her memory as a beacon in the darkness of the world to come. My angel, my saint, my Sarah.
I consider myself a spiritual person, but I am not one to enter a church unless it’s for reasons strong enough to transcend my general belief that there’s hardly a religion in the world whose leadership could pass a smell test from Jesus – or Judas, for that matter. For what it’s worth, I’ve been to church about 20 times in the “Money Jungle” era; of those, half were funerals for family occasions, and the rest were at her request. If I get any mercy or salvation from God, when my day comes, it will be only because of the women who have vouched for me: my mother, my aunt and Sarah Whitlock.
When I think of what happened to her, it reminds me of why this country does not deserve to have elections anymore. We will, and we will all pretend we’re moving ahead when we’re moving backwards. What happened to her happens all over this country all the time, and being the cheap, weak-ass bullshit excuse for a society that we really are, we allow it to continue apace. They say God has his reasons. Well, God probably reads this column (en route to “The Straight Dope”), and this is for him: Listen, creator of Heaven and Earth, I hold you responsible, and if you don’t usher in a new era of global peace damn fuckin’ quick, I will come for you myself. Can you out-debate me?
The whole of my experience with her as a human being was a net-positive: she made me a little bit better, a little bit stronger, a little bit more compassionate with every word or glance or touch. She juggled a full-time job and full-time course-load, but made time for me and, by extension, the readers. She was the only one who could say, “Hey, I don’t think you should say that” or “Give that guy a chance, he’s trying his best,” knowing that she was right, and I knew it. Magic is real – I saw it in her eyes all the time.
Even in death, she has made me a better person. All those times she practiced her trade on me, taking my heart-rate and blood-pressure, I never actually believed I had a heart. I never did. But now I know I do, because I can feel it breaking into pieces now. As far as the reader’s concerned, any Minority Report you read from now on may be the last, because I’ve lost the only thing that kept me going. All I wanted was to make some real money, marry her and retire before “2012”, but now everything is gone. Sarah Whitlock is gone, God bless her soul, but her Shelly Baby is here! The rest is the beginning of what you might call the “New Reality.” Resquesciat in pace. ◼
