Since I heard the news of Trey Pennington’s death this afternoon, I’ve been depressed, and somewhat angry, more dismayed than anything else

……. why did he do it – why did he kill himself?

I knew Trey Pennington for about two years, and had met him 4 or 5 times, the last time I saw him was at the Likeable Social Media book launch in late June, in Manhattan.  Trey was always a quiet person, somewhat of an enigma I never quite figured out, but truly liked.  I probably don’t have as much to say about Trey Pennington as The BrandBuilder, in his post today, titled Heartbroken.

but like Oliver… I, too, am heartbroken, and trying to make sense of it all.  

I’m not alone in missing Trey Pennington, he will be missed, is missed by many.

When I first met Trey Pennington it was in London at the Social Media Monitoring conference, seeing Trey there was a surprise and I had been curious about him for several months before.  Once we met, we hit it off and I invited Trey to speak at the NY DataStories meetup in New York, that I co founded.

Here’s the entire video of that appearance.

….

…….

We can speculate why he took his life, what drove him to do it, or if there was a way any of us could have helped him.  I don’t know if we could have stopped this, if any one could have…. but I’d like to think that  .. this could have been prevented.

I know Trey Pennington had a large family, a wife and 6 children – the shock of his passing, especially this way must be very hard to burden for them, and the community he lived.

There was signs that something was up earlier this summer, Trey was no longer posting to his blog and was going to not post to Facebook (and Twitter?) but I don’t think he ever stopped that part, his last blog post was on June 7th.

I wondered, earlier this summer, if something was up with Trey.  When I saw Trey, last,  in late June, he had lost some weight and seemed quiet – he was often quiet, listening to others speak, listening to me speak.

Little did I realize the daemons he was fighting, the weight of depression that he was carrying.

Perhaps if I had stopped talking for a moment, let him speak, and really felt, deep in side, of myself, I’d have seen something was not quiet right with him, that he was struggling with a sadness he could not share, but perhaps, no longer could shoulder.

Wondering about the scene of the suicide - if the reports are true, did he plan to walk into his church with the gun, and by shooting himself in the parking lot, weather he planned to take his life at the church, or did he suddenly take his own life on an impulse.

Did he go to the church with a gun to settle a score, or to commit the unthinkable right there?

I don’t know, and I think we’ll probably never know for sure (unless we find a note or video that tells us); all I know is that the world is poorer for Trey Pennington’s death and I will miss him greatly, and I won’t be alone – Trey had many, many friends – we will all miss him.

RIP – Trey Pennington – I hope you find, in death the peace that escaped you in life.