Death of a “vampire”

For those who aren’t already aware, Sanguinarius passed from this life on Monday, August 3rd, 2015. She will be greatly missed.

I’m writing this to remind myself that these are real people, these self-professing “real” vampires. They are not cartoon caricatures. They have thoughts, feelings, people whom they love and people who love them. Families and friends. As bizarre as their lifestyle choice may be to an outsider, and as easy as it would be to simply write them off as kooks or crazies, the truth is that many if not most of these practicing “vampires” are just like us, with the single exception that, for whatever reason, they crave and ingest blood.

“Sanguinarius” may have been a suitably vampiric-sounding moniker, but it belonged to a real person, a lady whose real name was Liz. Looking at her photograph, she doesn’t look at all like what a vampire is supposed to look like. She looks like the kind of nice lady you’d meet at a bake sale. She looks like your next door neighbor. That’s the lesson to take away from this. When we envision one of those self-proclaimed “vampires” we tend to picture some weirdo under tons of Goth makeup and fake fangs. At least I do. But that is rarely the case, it would seem. I offer my condolences to the loved ones of Ms. Sanguinarius. May she rest in peace.