Lenten Reflections: The Frailty of Life – Remembering Beau

This Lenten season started off yesterday with Ash Wednesday, and for me with some very saddening news about a friend of mine.  It was confirmed to me last night, as I was driving to work, that my good friend from Nickelsville, Aaron “Beau” Beaucage, had died earlier in February.   Beau had left Nickelsville just after New Years Day in the hopes of pursuing a job opportunity in California.  He left unexpectedly, and there was not much information on exactly where he went or specifically what for.  While in CA, the work opportunity did not pan out and Beau continued to struggle with depression daily, as he hoped to be with his daughter and his girlfriend in Indonesia, but could not afford to get there.  He apparantly died in his sleep somewhere around the first of February.  The actual cause of his death is unknown at this time.  I can’t help but wonder, had he been here, around friends, would his death had even happened; had he had friends to walk through his depression and come along side of him through that hard time.  I am deeply saddened by this loss as I had developed a great relationship with Beau over the four months that I knew him.  We had numerous conversations about many different things and I believe we connected on many levels, especially in the ways we viewed people and the world around us.

Beau also was an incredible poet, writing numerous poems about life and the struggles it contains, and I had the privilege of experiencing many of them.  We had lots of conversations about the art of poetry and lyrics.  He challenged me to write songs from his poetry and so I did.  I quickly took two of his poems and wrote songs from them, which I still play frequently at Nickelsville, and they have become anthems.  We talked often about our ideas of the poetry book that Beau wanted to publish and the (quasi-fictional) story of Onus Lumins, (which was Beau’s pen name) who was a truck driver who would place his poetry books in the restrooms at truckstops to counter all the negative graffiti on the walls with positive, creative and inspiringly artistic poetry.  He wanted to write a book about that story and we even discussed a movie, where some traveling musicians find the poetry book and start writing music to the poems and the two combined cause the musicians to become highly successful, while all the while searching to find the artist that created such amazing lyrics.  

Beau was an amazing guy, who ended up homeless after the trucking industry became too expensive to survive because of rising gas prices and while trying to go out on a fishing boat, missed the opportunity because of a slowdown in the industry.  He had only been homeless for about 6 months when he ended up at Nickelsville and I met him.  We made an instant connection and he was on my heart often.  Maybe it was the convergence of two artists that drew us together, or maybe the deep conversations we had that intrigued us both, or maybe it was just God’s leading… for whatever reason, he had a huge affect on my life and I know I had an affect on his.  He was a huge catalyst in changing the way I viewed ‘the homeless’.  He was the one that challenged me to come and live in Nickelsville, and when I stayed there before New Years, I spent most of my time with him.  He introduced me to “Flight of the Conchords” (look it up , and when I was staying there, each night we hung out in his tent until 3am, talking and watching episodes on the laptop, that he was given so that he could write and post and print all of his poetry.  

I remember sitting in Trabant coffee shop in U District, with Beau and Dustin and some others from the camp, having conversations about many things.  I remember him telling me ‘it’s never to late to do anything you want to… there is always a way to do what you really want to do and make things happen, regardless of how old you get… it’s never too late!”  That was one of the last conversations we had together.  His words were inspiring… our conversations were intriguing.  I am thankful for the opportunity to have known him and shared in his life, if even for a short time.  

His words will live on through his poetry, of which I have a small collection of.  I wish that I had access to his whole collection… I would make sure that they would be published somewhere for all to experience… that is exactly what he would have wanted to happen with his poetry.  It would be beautiful to be able to use his poetry to raise money to help support places like Nickelsville and efforts to advocate for the ‘homeless’.  I will pursue writing and completing a full album of his words with my songs and record it for everyone to hear.  His story and his advocacy for the homeless problem will continue to fuel me in my efforts to change ‘homelessness’ and change the way people think about my friends that live outside.

So as I reflect on the memories of Beau, I am reminded of the frailty of life… and how important it is to make the best of every opportunity… to love others as you love yourself and let others do the same for you.  This is the stuff that changes lives in this fragile world we live in.  I will miss Beau terribly, but his memory will live on… I know I will do my part to make that happen.  I will probably post more about Beau in the weeks to come, but for now I will close with this clip of the video he made of himself reciting one of my favorite poems of his “Nothing is Meaningless”, which is also one of the poems I put to music.  

Beau, you will be greatly missed!!

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