Remember Jeff Buckley {R.I.P.}

It's been 9 years today - May 29 - since Jeff Buckley died. This post and this day is dedicated to Jeff Buckley. Make today Jeff Buckley Day.



Jeff Buckley died in an accidental drowning on May 29 a little after 9pm. If you know the story just skip to the next paragraph. They said that he called all his friends that he hadn't spoke to in awhile and just talked. He called his ex girlfriend to tell her he'll see her on the other side. When you see him in interviews, you would never think he was planning on passing on. He looked as if he was planning on something bigger. Perhaps death were his bigger plans. In my opinion, he never wanted to die but if that chance came to him, he would not fight it. The fact that nobody will ever know is the saddest thing of all.

During my darkest days and my darkest moods, Jeff Buckley would always relax me. I would slip into my own world and forget all the bad things that were going on in my life. At that moment I was a new person and nobody could ever take that away from me. When he died, a part of me died. I would never be the same again.

My life was already fucked up before he died. It was just his music was the only thing keeping me from falling over the edge. Before his death I started not going to school and I stopped seeing my friends. Sometimes I wouldn't come home for days. My parents eventually gave up on calling the cops on me because they knew I'd just get angrier and shout and everybody or try something worst. I started hanging out with the wrong crowd and started to constantly take pain killers and other pills.

I still remember that day. I was crashing at a house and it was on TV that Jeff Buckley is missing and presumed dead and that the last time they saw him he was near the river. They would find his body days later. I was already on the edge, I just needed something to push me over. I just walked out of the house and just walked for what felt like miles. I had no idea what I was going to do next. He was like the tortured souled older brother I never had. To me, he was the only family I had left in this world. I wasn't thinking straight and my mind was racing. I had just over $50 bucks in my pocket and I knew exactly where I was going to go. I knew this guy that gave out a lot of uppers and downers, so I went to his place and gave him all my money and took whatever I could get. After I took whatever I had, all I could remember after that is walking down the sidewalk feeling really dizzy. I woke up in the hospital days later. I guess somebody actually still cared. I had my stomach pumped. My parents were the only ones in the room with me. I couldn't look them straight in the eye. They were silent and I was silent. I didn't talk to anybody for months. I was under suicide watch for a while but I wasn't thinking about killing myself anymore. They kept me in the hospital for awhile and released me in my parents care. I had to go to counseling and see a therapist for a long time after that. I didn't start talking again until October of that same year. I remembered I got tired of the therapist trying to get me to talk so I talked just so I couldn't see her as much about a couple of weeks before Halloween. One helpful advice she told me was whenever I'd feel really stressed or feel suicidal, I should just find a peaceful time of my past and keep that memory going until I'm relaxed. I told her I wasn't suicidal but she didn't believe me. I find just taking a drive to the middle of nowhere for at least a day and just think about life helps me alot.

Eventually things got better for me. I told myself that every year on May 29th I would always remember Jeff Buckley in my own special way. Even though his death brought me closer to my death, I still feel that without him my life would've taken that wrong path of death long before this all happened. One of these days I'm actually going to plan a trip to just go to his gravesite but I don't feel that I'm ready quite yet for it. Someday I will though, and on that day I will probably forgive myself for what I've done to my friends and family and to myself.

Jeff Buckley combined all kinds of music into one sound. He was definitely ahead of his time and it's a shame that not that many people knew who he was before he died. I think that he would've been one of the legends in music history. If you listen to his Grace cd you'll feel exactly what I felt listening to his music. He put his heart and soul into that cd and wanted everybody to know who he was.


So Real



Grace



My friends and I are going to a concert tonight with a few local bands performing Jeff Buckley songs acoustic. This is my tribute to Jeff Buckley for May 29, 2006.






















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