Julie Bull was a close friend of Stephen Smith, the well-loved Gabriola teenager whose life was taken from him last May 17th in a violent attack at a party here in Nanaimo. At that point, although she was soon to graduate from NDSS, Julie thought that much of her future had been ripped from her along with Stephen’s life.

Fortunately since then Julie has learned that in the vast majority of cases the most terrible events in our lives usually end up leading us in positive directions.

Here are some excerpts from a letter Julie wrote at that time of Stephen’s death.

“I have always been a strong believer that our past molds our future, that it creates the person we become. Now more than ever I feel my past guiding me into the future although I no longer have a clear imprint of what I want. That’s gone. It went with Stephen.

“Until recently I was planning a year long trip to Africa. The thought of helping people in another country sent me running to sign up. I was prepared to leave my family, to leave Nanaimo, but now all I want to do is hide from the world, from its anger, its hate and even its love.

“The night Stephen Smith was killed I lost a trust in people that I can never regain. What I saw has shattered my life. All plans for my future seem fruitless. I’m just trying to get by day by day … The thought keeps running through my head, ‘If Stephen doesn’t have a future, why should I?’ … The person I was to become, or thought I was to become, is gone. Now I must find an alternate route.”

As Julie closed her letter, she repeated her belief that her past will strongly influence her future and, with Stephen’s death very much in mind, she concluded, “Stephen will give me the strength to make a difference.”

Since that terrible time last May, Julie has found the strength to move on with her life. She has spent the last five months in a training program in Michigan, a program that will lead her to a six month volunteer opportunity in southern Zambia and she attributes much of the strength she needed to move forward with her life to her memory of Stephen.

In short she feels that to some degree she is living for both of them.

Until she left for Michigan last summer, Julie had only been off the Island a few times in her life and then she had gone only as far as Vancouver. So it required a huge adjustment when she found herself thousands of miles away, surrounded by total strangers. Often, she says, she felt like giving up but then she would think of Stephen and find the strength she needed to keep going.

Starting in February Julie will be volunteering in an isolated village in southern Zambia. Her primary responsibility will be to work with children but she will also help teach villagers about tree planting, soil erosion, nutrition, latrine and solar oven construction and more.

I’m sure Stephen Smith never thought that he would provide much of the energy needed to help children and others in Zambia … but even after his death he has. I wonder how much more Stephen will achieve through his friends and family?