The morning after I killed myself, I woke up.
I made myself breakfast in bed. I added salt and pepper to my eggs and used my toast for a cheese and bacon sandwich. I squeezed a grapefruit into a juice glass. I scraped the ashes from the frying pan and rinsed the butter off the counter. I washed the dishes and folded the towels.
The morning after I killed myself, I fell in love. Not with the boy down the street or the middle school principal. Not with the everyday jogger or the grocer who always left the avocados out of the bag. I fell in love with my mother and the way she sat on the floor of my room holding each rock from my collection in her palms until they grew dark with sweat. I fell in love with my father down at the river as he placed my note into a bottle and sent it into the current. With my brother who once believed in unicorns but who now sat in his desk at school trying desperately to believe I still existed.
The morning after I killed myself, I walked the dog. I watched the way her tail twitched when a bird flew by or how her pace quickened at the sight of a cat. I saw the empty space in her eyes when she reached a stick and turned around to greet me so we could play catch but saw nothing but sky in my place. I stood by as strangers stroked her muzzle and she wilted beneath their touch like she did once for mine.
The morning after I killed myself, I went back to the neighbors’ yard where I left my footprints in concrete as a two year old and examined how they were already fading. I picked a few daylilies and pulled a few weeds and watched the elderly woman through her window as she read the paper with the news of my death. I saw her husband spit tobacco into the kitchen sink and bring her her daily medication.
The morning after I killed myself, I watched the sun come up. Each orange tree opened like a hand and the kid down the street pointed out a single red cloud to his mother.
The morning after I killed myself, I went back to that body in the morgue and tried to talk some sense into her. I told her about the avocados and the stepping stones, the river and her parents. I told her about the sunsets and the dog and the beach.
The morning after I killed myself, I tried to unkill myself, but couldn’t finish what I started.
By Meggie Royer
Source: The Minds Journal
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This is different from what I usually see on this site, but it is powerful. Sometimes it is too easy to lose perspective and give into despair. Thank you for this strange, yet uplifting story.
ReplyDeletethe morning after i killed myself, i realized my pain was coming from a person i had never met, and i wanted to meet her. i wanted to know her name. but i didnt have the chance. the morning i killed myself, she was waiting for me, to make this life a life worth living again, to heal me, and to save me from the emptiness that had become of my life, the morning i killed myself, i stopped for a moment and remembered myself, and my pain was no longer worth dying for, but worth living for, intstead,
Deletethis is perfectly said.
Deleteit's kind of eerie and yet so beautiful
ReplyDeleteIn some cases, suicide can be, and is, a valid alternative to a particularly severe level of grief, emptiness, loneliness, mental anguish, psychic pain.
ReplyDeleteSome, just some.
~Gail
Hi disco gail! You are so right and nobody has the right to intervene. I am in constant severe physical and emotional pain. My body my decision. my daughter and i were abandoned by my now ex wife. She became an addict and destroyed everything i spent my entire life building. I lost everything but my daughter. I live in terror of being homeless and being victimized. I am disabled and can no longer work. I don't have anyone but my daughter and i almost never see her. I cannot sleep ever. I have spent the last 2 1/2 yrs trying to get better but i haven't. I have had therapy that entire time and i am still as terribly depressed and grieving. At least once i am gone i won't hurt anymore.
Delete