Kobe.

Man. I don't even know where to begin. He was my hero. I mean, he still is my hero, but HE isn't. I don't know what this piece is. I don't know what I'm doing here. This is just my thoughts, my experiences, my emotions. I'm just trying to handle this loss. I don't know how to. If you think this is a well-written, professional, piece, turn away now. This blog is going to be all over the place. You've been warned. There aren't going to be any pictures or videos linked here, because I just can't bring myself to look at them. I'm sorry.

I've never experienced death like this. The last time someone in my family died, I was 10 years old and it was my 90-something-year-old great-grandmother. I don't even know if I cried. I do remember seeing my dad cry and that was hard. But this Kobe news? Man, this is just something else. I don't know what this feeling is. They say never meet your heroes, but I won't even ever have that choice anymore. He's just gone. Just like that.

Where do I even begin with something like this? Kobe was just such an icon. Even outside of basketball. I was going through twitter, Instagram, and I see all these people, all these celebrities, expressing their love and respect for Bean. People I never would have expected to be basketball fans, let alone Kobe Bryant fans. His impact was so HUGE.

I guess I'll just start from the beginning? 2014? I think? I remember one of my friends from high school introducing me to basketball. I won't name him here, for the sake of privacy, but if you're reading this, you know who you are. You're probably thinking to yourself, "Man what a clown, writing this big-ass story for nothing. Lame." But I don't care. You were always that ballbuster and that's why I looked up to you for so long. You were like an older brother to me, and I don't even know what is up with you right now. Are you dead, alive? No clue.

But that's enough about my friend, let's talk about the actual story. I was watching an anime at the time, because my friends were really into it, called Kuroko no Basuke - or Kuroko's Basketball. That was the first twinge in me, the first time I felt like I might like basketball. And then this friend of mine showed me a Kobe mixtape. "You like that anime right? Watch this. This is Kobe. He's my favorite player." (Or something along those lines, I don't remember it was 6 years ago). I remember thinking to myself, "if he's good enough for this dude, he's probably good enough for me."

Since then, I became a Kobe-stan. You know, the ones crazy enough to make the Kobe > Jordan arguments? That was me, circa 2014. I watched more highlights, more NBA basketball. I read more articles. I watched documentaries. I took online quizzes. "What NBA Player are you? What NBA team are you a fan of? Can we guess your basketball position in 10 questions?" I was in love. In love with the sport, in love with the competition, in love with my team, in love with Kobe. He could do no wrong, in my eyes. I found the Mamba Mentality. I thought it was genius. I found out Kobe and I shared the same birthday - August 23rd. I read all the crazy Kobe Stories, about his work ethic. His dedication. His pursuit of perfection. The man was crazy. People told me about how selfish he was, how Kobe was an awful teammate, how nobody liked him, how he had no friends. Apparently this was supposed to turn me off from him. It didn't. How badass is it to say "I don't have friends because I don't need them." WHAT A GUY. I tried to apply that mentality to my own life. Things got hard in my personal life. High school is not the kindest place, and we all have had some sort of experience with that. And now, when I look back at my problems and issues, I laugh. They mean nothing in the grand scheme of things. "Oh no, this dude got mad at you! Boo-hoo, some chick won't text you back. This is so sad, you only got a 93 on a math test!"

None of that means anything now, but at the time, it was everything to me. I felt lost, all alone in a world that didn't care. I could barely handle it, barely get to school and function. But what got me through it, was that ever-famous, totally corny "Mamba Mentality."

I would think to myself, "What would Kobe do?" If it weren't for Kobe and basketball, I'm sure I would have turned to drugs, just like many of my friends and teammates. But I didn't.

One of the only things that made me feel any better was hitting the court. My physics teacher would be in class droning on about Newton's laws of motion, but I'd be on the court shooting jumper after jumper. Was I ever the best player at school? No. But I don't think anyone can say they loved the game more than me. Because nobody loved the game more than Kobe.

During one of these stretches in school when I was devastated by something ridiculous, I ended up putting on a lot of weight, and I knew I needed to burn it off. It was affecting my play, and I couldn't have that. Tournament season was coming up and I needed to be there for my teammates. Kobe was dependable. I had to be too. I found hundreds of "inspirational", "motivating" speeches and videos on youtube to try to get me off my ass. The only thing that really worked was this one right here. I had a habit of staying up late, doing nothing. This video popped up in my recommended feed one day at 3 am. And every night, I'd be on the floor, doing crunches, bicep curls, running in place in an attempt to do cardio, whatever else I could do in the silent confines of my bedroom. Nobody knows this. Not my parents, not my friends, not my coach. Nobody. I did it for myself, and the giant poster of Kobe staring at me from my wall. I ended up hitting the go-ahead bucket in the upcoming tournament to put my team in the finals. Coach subbed me in to start the 4th when we were down 11. I was coming off a brutal left calf injury. But I had to win. Kobe always did. I played my ass off, through the pain for 10 minutes, until I was finally able to put up the shot to win the game. Yes, it was a 3-point play. Yes, it was a fadeaway with some huge dude in my face. Yes the crowd went nuts. I hit the only free throw of the game for my team to put us up 1. I flashed my jersey to the opposing team's bench on my way back on defense. 'SHIKHAR #24'

I felt like Kobe. I felt like a winner. (My team went on to lose in the final game by 40 but that's not important).

Now, if you noticed, I said I got into basketball in 2014. I missed his whole career, pretty much. I missed the 5 championships. I missed the 62 points in 3 quarters. I missed the 81 point game. I missed his lob to Shaq. I missed him standing on the scorers' table after winning in 2010. I missed the countless times Kobe tortured the Raptors. I missed when he didn't flinch. I missed when he airballed threes against Utah in the playoffs. I missed him killing Steve Nash. I could go on and on about Kobe's legendary career and how much of it I only got to witness on Youtube, or from secondhand accounts online. But what I didn't miss, was his last game. 2016.

I grew up in India. NBA games would be on at 7 am. I had school at 8. I would record them on the DVR and watch them when I came back home from school. But not this one. This game was too important. I BEGGED my mom to let me skip school. ONE DAY. How much could I possibly miss in a single day? JUST ONE. But she wouldn't let me, of course not. The next morning I remember getting ready for school, mad at my mom, sad that I would miss yet another key moment in Kobe's career. And then something amazing happened. My mom got a phone call saying school had been canceled because of an unforeseen circumstance. That was the first time I believed in the "Basketball Gods." I remember watching that game. It was a total rollercoaster emotionally. He started 0-5 (if I remember correctly, I am not fact-checking anything, this is all just from my heart), and I thought to myself, "Not like this Kobe. I know you're not going out like this."

And he didn't. He ended up making his next 4 shots, and as we all know, finishing the game with 60 points. 60. I'm not sure how many people realized the poetry in the final game, but i know I did. Kobe's first career points came from the free-throw line. The 81st point in 2006 was a free throw. When he passed Jordan for 3rd all-time in points, it was on a free throw. His 60th point was, of course, a free throw. As a rookie, he struggled against the Jazz in the playoffs, as I mentioned earlier, airballing the 3s. He smacked the Jazz in his last game. He delivered one final time, coming back from behind, hitting the go-ahead jumper late in the game. I was in tears. Tears of happiness that he played well, and tears of pain that Id never get to see him again.

I couldn't stop talking about him, or the final game for weeks at school. I would bring it up whenever I could. I would bring it up even when I couldn't. He was my hero.

Kobe's legend as a basketball genius can never be overstated. He was an absolute savant. I have many dreams in life, many of which revolve around Kobe. Ever since I watched him play, my dream was to meet him. To see him. To talk to him. As I grew up and matured slightly, so did my dreaming. I then dreamt of playing with him. Playing against him. Interviewing him, Watching NBA Film with him. Now, none of them will ever happen. I had many dreams in life, many of which revolved around Kobe.

January 26th, 2020. One of those days you'll never forget where you were or what you were doing. Me? I was taking a shower. I like to listen to music in the shower, so I put my phone in a little Ziploc bag so I can have it with me. I was listening to some music, as always, when the music stopped for a second. I checked my phone to see what happened, and I saw a tweet from Kevin O' Connor, that said "No please don't let the Kobe news be real" (paraphrasing here) and my first instinct was to think he got hurt, or he said something controversial or yelled at a fan or some other terrible PR move that would hurt his legacy. I braced myself as I opened the app and I scrolled past what seemed like an infinitely long chain of tweets from all the Lakers reporters, writers, bloggers, podcasters that I follow - each saying something along the lines of "No, Kobe. It cant be" and this feeling of absolute dread washed over me. The shower was still running when I saw TMZ's tweet, talking about the helicopter crash, 42s ago. My heart fell. I dropped my phone. I fell to my knees. It didn't hit me for about 10 minutes; I was just in denial. "Its TMZ, it can't be real." "Its Kobe, he found a way to survive." "There's no way."

But it was true. My hero had been taken from me. Millions of people's hero, gone. A father. Gone. A husband. Gone. A son. Gone. A brother. Gone. A teammate. Gone.

There's nothing I can say that can make anyone feel better. There's nothing I can say to make the pain easier. There's nothing I can say that can sum up the greatness of Kobe Bean Bryant.

I hope Kobe, Gianna, and the 7 others that lost their lives in Sunday's helicopter crash are able to rest in peace knowing they will be loved forever by the entire world. I pray that Vanessa has the strength to endure not only the loss of her husband but her 13-year-old baby girl. My thoughts and heart go out to all the victims' family and friends and everyone that had to face the pain of losing their loved ones.

But Kobe wouldn't want you to mourn, or stay mourning. No. Captain America in Avengers: Age of Ultron said, "If you get hurt, hurt 'em back. If you get killed, walk it off." I can imagine Kobe saying that right now, as he would tie his shoes getting ready to drop 50 on someone. Because that's what Mamba Mentality was all about.

I know Kobe is in heaven right now, trash-talking Wilt Chamberlain, grilling David Stern about the Chris Paul trade veto and catching up with Dr. Jerry Buss and of course, working out with Gianna.

I love you, Kobe. Thank you, thank you for everything. Rest easy. You deserve it.

#LakeShow