From a Brooks classmate

E-mailed in by Mat:

Today was a bad day, as I kept thinking about Debra. I can't explain how fast the thoughts of Brooks flooded back. Back to the times both good and bad, tripping through our artistic endeavors. Bonding to each other like "life mates" on a raft in the middle of an ocean. All of us from somewhere else, and all we had were each other... and a dream. Somehow I think we all had the same or similar dream at Brooks, and were bound to build it our own way. If we could just figure that part out.
I have thought about those times more and less throughout my photographic career and wondered how everyone else was doing. I knew I was a photographer and some weren't. I knew I didn't finish Brooks and some did. I wondered where I fit in, if I was as good as I could have been had I stayed. Would the path have been as difficult as it was (and still is)? It seems like an endless chase if you haven't let it go by now, and I think Debra was a chaser. I think she even caught the tail end of her dreams from time to time looking at her beautiful work and credits.
How sad the feeling when a dreamer lets go. There's an empty pit in my stomach now as I feel that even though we weren't close, I have lost a sister, a fellow dreamer, a Brookie.

Miserably,

~Mat