Sam

My dear friend Hilary has lost her nephew Sam.

I've been struggling all week trying to find the right words to say and there just aren't any. He was 13 and it is awful.

I met Sam on my first trip to England in 1996 when he was just a baby. My heart is broken for his mom, his siblings and his grandparents. I keep thinking about Hilary who would give anything she had for her nieces and nephews.

Today the news made international headlines when information was released that he was being bullied on the social networking site Bebo. So now the family's tragedy is going to be paraded around as an example.

Kids are kids and they tease each other horribly. But things are worse somehow when they are in writing. The nicest person you know can send you an email that comes off as harsh and nasty - it has happened to all of us. Maybe the taunts a kid can put up with in the school hallways are unbearable when they are in writing on a screen in their bedroom. I don't know.