Friday, Jan. 28, 2005 | 7:09 PM

I don't know why I'm sitting here typing right now. Something horrible happened and I can't get my mind around it.

A woman I knew while I was in college was murdered yesterday. Her name was Nicole duFresne. She was murdered outside a bar. She was 28 years old.

I didn't know her very well. I was always too in awe of her to be her friend really, I guess. She was an outstandingly talented actress. Probably the best actress at Emerson while I was there. I rememeber watching her in our improv class, how sure and relaxed and spontaneous she was. She was full of life. She was beautiful. She didn't coast on that beauty. She had guts. She was outspoken. She pissed people off a lot but everyone loved her and as a theatrical perfromer, no one could touch her.

I thought about her the other night while I was watching Angels in America. I'd seen her do that show in Boston and was amazed at how she disappeared into the characters she played. She took risks as a performer. She had a gift.

She was going to get married in October. She died in her finace's arms. She was acting and writing and following her dream in New York.

Something horrible is sitting in the pit of my stomach right now. I am trying to reconcile this with my notion of a moral universe and I cannot. How can someone so vibrant be taken? And I sit here feeling ashamed of myself because I have been such a coward in so many ways in this life. And here is this woman who chased her dream, who was not afraid, who survived a great deal, who was politically active and in love and in one instant she is dead. I just don't know what to make of it.

I wish I could finish up what I want to say with some well thoughtout inspirational bit. But I can't. I am angry right now and I am sad in a way that I haven't been sad in a long long time. I have lost many people to illness and one to suicide. But this is something different. I wasn't her best friend. But she was somneone I so looked up to and who made me want to be a better actress and a better person. Now she is gone. Right now, at this moment, I do not know how to deal with that.