by Aly Beery
Arts Editor
The first time Elizabeth Pekarek ’05 removed her P-card from her wallet this semester, a small piece of paper fluttered to the floor. Written on the torn-off corner of a page were the words, “I love you. Love, Amy.” When Pekarek had left her wallet in Quad last semester, her friend Amy Wilson ’05 had stuck the note into Pekarek’s wallet while Wilson was working the breakfast shift.
Pekarek had read the note many times before, but the first time she saw it after winter break brought tears to her eyes instead of making her laugh or smile.
She had learned only a few days before that Wilson had committed suicide on Monday, January 13 in her home in University City, Mo. Pekarek got a call from Sara Scannell ’05, and when her mother delivered the message to her, Pekarek said, “Oh, she’s probably at Amy’s giggling about something and they decided to call me.” She had no idea that Scannell would give her such shattering news.
The note became a permanent fixture of Pekarek’s wallet the day Wilson slipped it in. “Even before we lost her,” Pekarek said at Wilson’s memorial service on Thursday, Jan. 23, “that note brought great joy to me every time I rediscovered it among the junk in my wallet.”
Loving to give
Wilson’s friends remember her as always making others feel loved. They said her desire to give seemed to flow naturally from her, as if she didn’t even have to think about it.
Her friends said that Wilson was an incredibly entertaining and enthusiastic friend, and her attitude and energy were authentic.
They now understand that Wilson was depressed, but she didn’t share details about her depression with her friends. She wasn’t secretive, but her mental health simply wasn’t an issue that Wilson discussed, even though, or perhaps because, she was so close to them. Making her friends happy was at the top of her priority list.
Little gifts like the note in Pekarek’s wallet were quite common from Wilson. She adored her friends, and she showed her appreciation for them with genuine gestures. “Amy gave herself to [her friends] in so many ways,” said Lisa Stevens ’05 at the memorial service, “Sweet notes, small trinkets, smiles, giggles, tight hugs… patience, understanding, and time.”
Art was very important to Wilson; she was a talented artist and planned to major in art history. Stevens noticed a parallel between both Wilson’s art and her relationships. “Amy took time and care with her artwork and she took time and care for her friends.”
Many of the stories Wilson’s friends tell portray her spontaneity and small size (5’2”). “Smallness was a big part of Amy’s life,” said Linda Wells ’05, “She even shortened her sentences to make them ‘Amy size.’ Instead of saying, ‘Hey guys, I’m getting tired, I think I’ll go to bed now,’ Amy would yawn, and make sleepy eyes, and say, ‘Amy sleep.’”
Wells, Stevens, Wilson, and Scannell ’05 moved to a group draw on Read 3rd this year after having lived together on Norris 4th.
Her friends said that sometimes Wilson’s sense of humor was cute, sometimes quirky, and sometimes just a bit inappropriate or unexpected. Regardless of the tone of her jokes and pranks, Wilson was always making others laugh. If no one else got the joke, Wilson would laugh on their behalf.
“When Amy first met Matt Ewing [‘02] in Free the Planet, we were driving to the Iowa STEP protest and he was going to sit in the back of the van next to her,” said Stevens ’05. “Matt asked her, ‘Is it all right if I sit here next to you?’ and she said, ‘I don’t know… my mom doesn’t let me touch boys… Well, now that I’m in college, maybe it’s okay.’ She just said it totally with a straight face, and he was a little afraid of her after that.”
“She just thought it was hilarious,” Wells said.
“And she didn’t bother to tell him later that she was joking because it was funnier that she didn’t,” Stevens added.
Her former floormates from Norris 4th, fellow FTP members, Read 3rd residents, and loved ones in her hometown said they will always remember Wilson as a vibrant person who loved to have fun. Those Wilson lived with will especially treasure pictures of Amy laughing in their memories.
“We’re the biggest dorks,” said Wells, “We have so much fun, and we laugh all the time… We used to have dinosaur time; Lisa, Amy, and I were studying one day and we just decided that we really needed to be dinosaurs.”
Wells laughed and Stevens chimed in, “We’d walk around, shouting out which dinosaur we were.”
“She was the best Velociraptor,” Wells said.
Infusion of art
In addition to a fabulous friend and dinosaur, Wilson was a committed student. “Amy really cared about all of her work being the best that it could be,” Stevens said. She pulled lots of all-nighters working intensely on research papers or artwork, but she made up for it during the day by spending lots of time wearing comfy clothes and taking naps.
“I have this image of Amy walking down the hall in these baggy blue sweat pants and a non-descript shirt,” Scannell said.
“The pants were always dragging on the floor,” Stevens said, “so they made more noise.”
“I just remember her walk,” Scannell said, “She sort-of shuffled.”
Bracken King, Wilson’s boyfriend whom she had been dating since high school, spoke about Amy’s artistic personality at her memorial service last week.
“Just as Amy infused her art into everything, she saw it in many places that we might easily pass over,” he said. “Those who have seen Amy’s room know exactly what I mean. The walls are filled with pieces of life, pieces of art, and thousands of pieces of her magazines that she was able to combine to a beautiful whole.”
King added that the art that didn’t fit on the walls was strewn on the floor, shelves, desk, and bed.
Wells believes that it was Wilson’s amazing talent for tiny details that caused her to neglect things like cleanliness. She would focus on a piece of art, a paper, or a gift for someone for hours until it was just the way she wanted it.
Becca Merrill ’05, a floormate of Wilson’s on Read 3rd, remembers Wilson’s gift of precision from an art class they shared last year. “She would remember seemingly insignificant things—details that I had forgotten that I had mentioned a week before when we were talking in class.”
Wilson’s friends found that the consciousness with which she treated her friends’ lives was unique, and for it she will be remembered. “Amy paid attention to detail when it came to her friends,” Wells said. “Amy listened, and Amy remembered. There was always the perfect card on your birthday, which Amy picked out herself and then had everyone else sign.”
Coming to terms
Wilson’s love for her friends was reciprocated, which Pekarek believes has a lot to do with why Wilson did not talk to her friends about her depression. “I think that she loved her friends so much that she didn’t want to worry or hurt us.”
Many students have been trying to reconcile the funny stories and images of Wilson as happy with the fact that she committed suicide. Some are shocked, others scared, and many perplexed. Emily Zdyrko ’05, a floormate of Wilson’s this year, said that she keeps trying to find something tangible that makes the situation make some sort of sense. “Depression is a disease,” she said, “The disease as a reason works, and yet it doesn’t work… it makes sense, yet it doesn’t make sense.”
Wilson’s friends are sure that regardless of Wilson’s reason for committing suicide, the vibrant personality that she exhibited was not a façade. The love she showed for her friends was consistent and was real.
“Being friends with Amy was like spinning, with our hands together, so fast that we couldn’t see anything else,” said Wells, “She had an amazing talent for creating a moment just for us… forgetting who else was watching. In such a short period of time, Amy reaffirmed my belief that to love is the greatest thing you can do.”
Memorial contributions may be made to the University
City Education Foundation c/o School District of
University City, 8346 Delcrest Drive, St. Louis, MO 63124;
or Shaare Zedek United Synagogue youth Group,
829 N. Hanley Rd., University City, MO 63130.
News | Arts | Reviews | Features | Opinion | Sports | Staff | Archives | Email the Editor | Email the Webmaster