Essay Contest: "Where Were You On 5/15?"

This is the essay contest, and since it is in honor of the approaching day of celebration, I guess we'll stick with the theme I originally suggested: Where were you on 5/15?

I'll give you my own mini essay right here. When I awoke on May 15, 2007, I was in a relatively glum mood. This was part of a prolonged spell of glumness, stemming back to the beginning of May and the first blog posts (with pictures) of Harlow and Brent romping together on Black's Beach.

Well, they weren't exactly "romping." In fact, in the blog comment storm following the Black's Beach visit, the one thing almost everyone agreed on was that Brent looked uncomfortable in those pictures. The dark glasses, wan smiles...Brent looked like he wanted to romp AWAY from Harlow at the soonest possible opportunity. Many bloggers from all the various "camps," from Cad to me, noted this.

But despite this glimmering that something here might be amiss...these photos when they came out plunged me into despair. Again, backing up in time to explain things: For MONTHS prior to this, ever since the murder and the revelation of the Drake/Harlow connection, I was one of a VERY small band of stalwarts that had been saying all along that Harlow was the murderer. It's hard to imagine this now, but before Arrest Day this was a VERY VERY minority opinion. The leading theories were that 1) Grant and/or Brent did it; 2) Aaron aka Robert Wagner did it 3) "bb" did it (LOL, ok, only one person thought this); 4) the "15 y/o" did this; 5) a random Brent fan did this; 6) Luzerne County did this, etc etc etc. All of these dominent theories had a common thread: poor innocent little Harlow being framed.

So, back then, whenever I tried to point out that based on what we know, it was near impossible for Harlow to have been framed, therefore, he must be the murderer (ie, Occam's Razor), I would get passionately drowned out by the majority opiners enumerated above.

So, Blacks Beach Day, yeah, that was a dark day for us Harlow-did-it stalwarts. I personally was stunned; I could not believe Brent and Grant were so stupid as to give a murderering thug a photo op like this. Did they not realize the obvious, as I did? OR PERHAPS...they knew he was a murderer, because they were all in it together? But, if that were the case...this was not only a stupid move on their part, it was a STUPENDOUSLY stupid move. It made them all look guilty! The whole thing...it was incomprehensible to me back then.

But the most depressing aspect of it all was (from my point of view) was that it indicated that the police APPARANTLY no longer had interest in Harlow and Joe as a suspect. How else could one explain Brent and Grant and Harlow and Joe's fearless decision to associate with one another so openly like this? I was crestfallen.

So, after two weeks of brooding in the aftermath of this...you all can now imagine my mood when I awoke on 5/15 of last year.

I had been thinking the past two weeks about just stepping away from all the blogs about this case, cold turkey. "What was the point?" I thought. So when I got up that day, I did not even bother to check in with Jason Curious or Elm (the two main sources for Kocis case chinwagging back then). I recall that I feared that I might read a "Mark@www.boisrus.com" post, and I simply did not want to go into work with the mild nausea such posts inflicted on me back then.

I go to work. It's a busy day, and I'm working on a big project, which at the time help take my mind off of all things Kocis. During my lunch break, I think to myself, do I really want to distract myself, checking in with the blogs? Naw. In fact, maybe this'll be the day I decide to simply quit them cold turkey? Naw...not today. I'll check in later. Maybe...

I throw myself back into my work. Theraputically distracting work! Late in the afternoon, I decide to take a break. Hmmm, maybe I'll take a quick 5 second peek at Elm blog, see if he's still whining about people not taking his stupid "Should Brent and Harlow film together?" poll...yeah a quick peek could do no harm...

I have been told by my coworkers that I let out a bloodcurdling shriek at this point. Honestly, I do not recall this. So, you'll have to take their word on this, not mine.

What I do recall is reading comment after comment after comment...with my glee increasing moment after moment after moment. I recall many of the comments saying "gee, where is jim?" and "yeah, I wonder why jim is not commenting on this" and such...LOL!

UNFORTUNATELY that work project which was a few moments ago so theraputic was now a roadblock. And it was calling me back...so I could only participate lightly in the discussion at this point. I dashed off a quick post, informing my fans that "I'm coming, don't worry, gloatfest on the way...!" or some such, and then went into a meeting.

I go to this meeting. People are saying stuff. I nod my head occasionally, when people say things to me. All my mental efforts are directed towards bottling up the pent up TEARS OF JOY from bursting out of my head!

I went home. I blogged. I saw many congratulatory comments directed to me. Sweet!

And that was my 5/15 story!

Nominations close on the 12th, then voting, winners announced on the 15th. The GLORIOUS 15th of May!

Update: Because we were all pretty shaken up by the events of this weekend, I think I will push back the day for nominations on all the contests until May 13. Then Voting will begin.