On Sunday, Jan. 28, we all got the devastating news of the deaths of Kobe Bryant, Gianna Bryant and several others. It was a shock to the nation, and the effects are still rippling throughout this week. There has been a lot of content circulating around Twitter, Instagram and different news sources accusing and speculating different types of information that may or may not be true. However, there is one thing that I feel everybody has gotten right: the impact that these deaths have had on every single person, basketball fan or not.

I have seen many different kinds of tweets surfacing, I assume it is because of the fact that everybody deals with death differently, however, the one I have seen the most often is people talking about how tomorrow isn’t promised. As college students, I feel we all get into a routine and sometimes we don’t think beyond that routine. It is frightening to think we have done something or talked to somebody for the last time and as humans, it is hard to comprehend that because we have been here for 20+ years experiencing life with people we forget aren’t indestructible.

We struggle with appreciating the moments we think will always be there, when, in reality, that might not be the case. We don’t realize the moment that one day we went out to play for the last time with our childhood friends, or that a kiss you had with the love of your life was going to be the last one. As people, we need to do better. We need to stop and think about who we really appreciate and care about in our lives and tell them. We are caught up in the fear of being too emotional or not being reciprocated the same type of appreciation. If we could start a chain reaction of normalizing telling people how we feel, wouldn’t that just be life-changing?

I want to leave you with something to think about. What is stopping you from telling somebody you love or appreciate them? Whatever that reason is, would you be okay with that being the thing that stops somebody else from telling you how they feel?