After the Death of Pablo Santos

For over a week, I've been sitting at my desk or at home on my couch pouring over articles and my own thoughts thinking that this is a really long dream I'm having. No. This is a nightmare. According to what I'm reading, it has been eight months since the death of actor, Pablo Santos, and I've been buried so deep into my own life, oblivious to the pain and heartbreak all who knew him have been experiencing. So as Pablo's people are coming to accept his demise, I haven't yet begun to grieve. Waiting. Hoping. Expecting to just wake up. My eyes are filled with fresh tears wondering what I was doing when he died.

I met Pablo back in 2003 when I was taking classes at Gloria Gifford Conservatory of Performing Arts. It is my nature to be reserved and taking this class with working actors was a bit intimidating at first. After a few classes a teenage boy stood a few inches taller than me and hugged me, as he did every class following.

"Hey Kobina! How are you?"

"I'm great Pablo! How are you?"

That's how he was - very friendly and open. Always sitting in the very front row of the dim theater of our classroom. Our instructor, Adam G., seemed to forever give him a hard time in front of us - like a loving and well-meaning, pain in the rear, older brother. Gloria Gifford, always tousling his dark brown hair and gushing over him like a doting mother. The actors that made up the GGC appeared to be a pretty tightly knit family and Pablo was definitely apart of it.

I discussed the school and our fellow actors on numerous occasions with one of my scene partners, and whenever Pablo's name came up, we seemed to both be amazed and excited about Pablo's accomplishments at such a young age, as well as his future in the business. Although my scene partner was a bit more animated about it than I was, we both came to the consensus that GGC was exactly where we needed to be. A large part of that conclusion came from the presence Pablo brought and the nurturing relationships we saw built around him at the school.

After two years, due to finances coupled with my daughters declining grades at school, I had to leave GGC to nurture my own. My baby needed me. The plan though, was always to return to GGC to continue to pursue my acting training when the situation at home had stabilized. Since I left, I've gotten different reports of the happenings with different actors from GGC, so I thought I was still partially in the loop. I just found out how terribly wrong I was.

All this time I've been waiting to see Pablo pop up on my TV screen. I was so sure that he would. A young talented and focused Latino actor...he was sure to shine in the spotlight - it was just a matter of time. Meanwhile, while I've been waiting for someone to call me and tell me about Pablo's next big project, I found out that time was not on his side.

I have not heard anyone say it out loud, and because of it, I find it so incredibly hard for me to believe the stuff that I'm reading, telling me of a plane crash he didn't survive in Toluca, Mexico, preparing to celebrate Mexico's Independence Day with friends last year.

How am I supposed to wrap my mind around the fact that I will never again share a stage with him; never have any projections of his gleaming future; never hug him and ask him how he's doing, and never see his easy smile?

I feel terrible for not being in tuned to what has happened to him, although I don't know what it was I should have done differently. Perhaps those who were close to him have found or are finding peace with his passing, but my mourning hasn't even began - because no one I know has said it out loud - to me.