From the Editor

Dear campus community,

We never meant for there for be another S&B this year. When, in the midst of our preparations for our last issue, the news came of Lenko’s death, we tried rapidly to go through a procedure that has become all too familiar in the last few months—recalling a community member’s life by talking to his friends.

But it was too soon. Many people’s grief was too intense and too present, and they were simply unable to talk to us. We therefore decided to write about Lenko and his death with what we had available: the comments of administrators about suicide.

We apologize for any pain that this decision caused anyone.

And then we learned of yet another death—the loss of Jonathan. Since Friday, the pain within the campus community has been palpable; everything has seemed to stop.

The staff was sitting on the porch of my house on Saturday afternoon, trying to think of what we do next, not only in our work, but as people. Like many of us this past week, the staff needed to do something, and what we can do together is to make a newspaper.

Others came to us as well, wanting to write about what they were thinking, how they were responding, what to do now. We publish this issue in part to give them a public voice.

We hope that this forum can collect friends’ recollections of Jonathan and Lenko into pieces that reflect their lives, and not only the circumstances of their deaths.

We also hope that this issue will help the community process and heal after such a horrible week. Inside, on pages three through six, there are profiles and memories of Jonathan Raxter and Lenko Stefanov. There are also a variety of resources: symptoms of depression, warning signs of suicide, places to turn if you need help. But much of the space is devoted to community reactions; we live in a community of writers and thinkers far more profound than we are, and we hope their wisdom may be a comfort to all of us.

Sincerely,

Katie Mears

Editor-in-Chief