Ten Hugs at Heaven's Gates
STORY By nicole iuzzolino
No day is ever promised. In the words of Euripides, a dramatist in classical Greek culture, “No one can confidently say that he will still be living tomorrow.” As college students, we wake up every day in a repeating cycle: get up, go to class, do homework, go to sleep and repeat. Plans are postponed due to “not feeling like going out tonight,” with the response always being, “I’ll go out tomorrow, I promise.”
But how can you promise something that is never guaranteed?
Krittin Na Ranong, or “Boomer,” knew that tomorrows were never a given. He lived each and every day as if it was his last. “He kind of just did whatever made him happy,” stated Owen Corrigan ‘22. “Whether that was riding around on his motorcycle, doing stuff here with us, he was just an exceptional person. Someone truly unique.” Boomer very much valued the “now,” with Corrigan noting he always took the extra time to remain present in all moments.
Boomer was originally from Thailand. He then moved to Florida and finally to New York, to attend Marist College. These journeys allowed him to gain a sense of adventure, and have fun with every day he had on this Earth. This same sense of adventure left a permanent impact on his fraternity brothers and close friends Owen Corrigan, Frankie Salles ‘22, Nathan Grivers ‘22 and Michael Mallozzi ‘22.
Photo courtesy of TDX
During the first semester of freshman year, Boomer to Grivers was just the boy who lived down the hall. It wasn’t until second semester when Grivers began the rush process that he became close to Boomer. Soon the two created a bond that held strong for 3.5 years, filled with prison workouts in the driveway at their house on High Street, nature walks full of conversations about how far they’ve come and chicken bacon ranch Campus Deli pizza. “I pledged with Boomer and I rushed with him…being able to call someone your brother is special but to be able to call someone your pledge brother is someone even closer.”
Now, in March of 2022, Corrigan, Salles, Grivers and Mallozzi sit on a couch packed with a number of their fellow Theta Delta Chi brothers, reminiscing on every moment they spent with Boomer and how they too, can live life fearlessly.
During the 2021 winter break, Krittin Na Ranong passed away in an accident while back home in Thailand. The sudden death sent waves of grief throughout the Marist community, with no heart left unscorned. For those four fraternity brothers in particular, they each felt a gaping wound – one that can never truly heal.
When the news first broke that Boomer passed away, so many from outside of the fraternity reached out to the brothers to share their condolences. This just showed how much of an impact Boomer made on so many people's lives. Corrigan noted that people from Florida, his cousins from Thailand, everyone in the Marist community and people that to him, were just strangers, reached out to show how much love they had for Krittin.
Corrigan received the call about Boomer’s passing first, making him responsible for spreading the news to the rest of the boys. “I thought it was some sort of messed up joke…I had just spoken to him a day or two prior. He called me and we had a facetime conversation, everything was normal.” The shock quickly faded into reality, as he made the phone calls he never once expected to make. “I had no time to grieve at that point. I was just let known that my best friend had died, and I had to call all my other best friends and let them know. It was one of the hardest things I ever had to do in my entire life.”
When Salles saw a phone call from Corrigan on his phone, he had a feeling that this was a call that shouldn’t get pushed to later. “It took a while for me to actually come to terms with that [Boomer’s passing], and I did feel a sense of peace though because I knew whatever he was doing when it happened was whatever he wanted to be doing.”
Like Grivers, Salles originally only knew Boomer as someone who lived a few doors down from him in his freshman dorm building. When quarantine hit, the brothers put their house on lockdown, allowing Boomer and Salles to spend every single day together. “When you spend time with somebody, every single day, you learn a lot about them. I would say that he [Boomer] was definitely a formative part of my personality now and how I treat people. He had a very large impact on me.”
The biggest impact that Boomer left on Salles was the idea of “letting go.” As Boomer continually lived in the absence of fear, he strove to make others around him live as freely as he did. “He did everything he wanted. He didn’t care about the repercussions or what could happen. If he wanted to do it at that moment, he was doing it.” Since Boomer’s passing, this ideology is something Salles took and ran with, knowing fully well with the attitude Boomer possessed, he lived a full life. “If I passed away tomorrow,” Salles reflected, “I wouldn’t be ready yet, because I cared so much about what people think and seeing him live without that fear has taught me that I should do the same.”
Illustration by Amanda Nessel
The way Boomer treated others was something that Salles and his fellow pledge brothers admired. “Everybody he interacted with, he treated as a friend, regardless of if he knew them for five minutes, five months or five years,” said Salles. “He loved to be around people and loved meeting new people.” Boomer was consistently described as being a bubbly ball of energy, someone you always felt close to and always wanted to gravitate towards.
Mallozzi continually gravitated toward the warmth that Boomer exuded. “He would always be the one to ask you how your day was. If you didn’t look like you were happy he would ask why. He was that one person that was always there for you, despite whatever that was going on in his life. He would always put another person first.” This warmth is something Mallozzi strives to replicate in his everyday life while taking up the values Boomer left behind.
In many of the boys' eyes, Boomer could turn any bad day into a good one. “You could be having the worst day and he would just know it. He could just say the right thing to anyone and immediately change their day around and brighten them up.” This is something Grivers still admires so much about Boomer. Boomer cared about the happiness of the ones he loved, so much so that he would make sure his friends each got their “ten daily hugs.” If they hadn’t, the boys would each receive those ten hugs, hugs full of kindness, purity and love; just a few of the words the brothers continually used to describe him.
When thinking of the prospect of what they would do if Boomer had one more day on this Earth, the boys smiled, a running faucet of ideas filling up their brains. From playing video games with Corrigan to having just one more nature walk with Grivers to Salles playing him “Boomer’s Interlude,” a song written in his memory, these are just a few of the many things they wish they could do with Boomer. For Mallozzi, all he wants to do is have one final conversation. “Now that I haven’t been with him, I want to tell him how much he really means to me. I wish I could one last time, before I didn’t get to see him again.”
In Frankie Salles’ song “Boomer’s Interlude,” Salles says that he knows Boomer will be waiting at Heaven’s gates, “arms open when you see me.” For the rest of the boys, they hope that this will be true, as receiving Boomer’s ten daily hugs someday, once more, will finally heal their wounds.
Photography by Alejandro Basalo