In memory of Paul Nutter: student, friend, fighter

When I spoke to my friend Paul for the last time in October, I knew things weren't good. I had hoped to visit him, and he told me, "Maybe in a few weeks, when I feel better."\nHe never felt better. For the past few months, I tried to call him, but either the phone was busy or no one answered. Last week, I finally spoke to his mother. "There's some sad news," she said.\nPaul Nutter, a Japanese major, died Jan. 24. He was 35.\nThree years ago, the day he was diagnosed with colon cancer, Paul called the IDS and suggested we run a story about him. From the beginning, Paul saw his disease as an opportunity to educate others.\nFormer IDS photographer Jim Bowling and I were assigned to the story, and for a few months we followed Paul's progress, accompanying him to chemotherapy, radiation and surgery, chatting with his family and hanging out with him. During the course of the story, Paul and I became friends. The next year we were in the same computer class and we would study together, often over pizza at Bear's Place. \nFrom the day I met him, I realized Paul was an extraordinary man.\n"There are certain things that get thrown at you in life," he told me. "How you deal with them is a testament to your character, to yourself."\nYou would be hard-pressed to find someone as joyful as Paul, a man who personified optimism. His teachers said he was the life of the class; his friends, the life of the party. He loved IU basketball and treasured the get-well cards he received from former coach Bob Knight. \nThroughout the chemotherapy that made his hair fall out in clumps, throughout the radiation that left his body sore, he never complained, and he worried more about his family than himself. When it came down to it, he really only wanted one thing: to graduate from IU. He realized at the beginning of last year he never would. Paul was nine credit hours shy of finishing his degree.\nIt was hard for his family and friends to believe that their wise-guy was sick. This was the toddler who wandered into his neighbors' houses unannounced for dinner. The high school freshman who dressed up like a Fruit of the Loom guy for Halloween and couldn't fit through the door. The teenager who introduced himself to his older sister Margie's friends as "Paul, but you can call me stud." \nYou would have liked Paul. He possessed all the qualities you would seek in a friend: humor, sincerity, compassion and incredible optimism. \nEven when he was ill, Paul kept his spirits high. He brightened a setting as dismal as a cancer clinic, striking up conversations with other patients as he was injected with chemotherapy liquid.\nEven in the hospital he found something to be happy about. "These nurses are great," Paul told me conspiratorially. He flirted with them shamelessly. (They flirted back.) \nAs much as he hid his pain with humor, Paul went through a tremendous ordeal. The Nutters were no strangers to this disease: Paul was 14 years old, a high school freshman, when he lost his father to esophageal cancer. The past three years took Paul and his family through an endless series of ups and downs. \nEvery time they took a deep breath and thought he might have beat it, the cancer came back with a vengeance. The surgeries drained him so much that often he didn't have the concentration to read or to watch a movie.\nBut Paul gritted his teeth and smiled. He accepted his limitations. He loved life, even when life was unkind.\n"Every day I wake up," he told me, "is an inspiration."\nSeveral times, I tried to tell Paul how brave he was, how he inspired me. He would have none of it, dismissing me with a non-committal wave of his hand. "Anyone in my situation would be like this," he told me. "You never know how you're going to deal with something until it happens. You would be just as strong."\nSomehow, I don't think so. Paul didn't give himself enough credit. \nHe often spoke of the "on," the Japanese concept of a debt of gratitude. He felt he had an on to his family for their love and support.\nAnd I have an on to Paul for the stunning example he set. He showed me to face hardship with humor, uncertainty with courage. I will always remember him.