Die inside.

I was leaning into her car, when she told me. After a weighted pause, I was told that a person I knew had committed suicide. At first, it was quite difficult to take in. She didn't appear the kind. To commit suicide. She seemed so sure of herself. At times cocky, to the untrained eye. However, it would be silly to discount how she wore her chinks. There is no mistaking the vulnerability.

When I knew this woman, she was spearheading efforts to produce a play in which I was cast. It was a good project, it had all the trimmings for one hell of a reunion, if you know what I mean. In short, I really enjoyed my time working on this. I made a couple of friends, met up with others who weren't half as bad to hang out with while I lived (and loved) in this particular city.

She and I never really got on famously; the project however, threw us together and we were quite friendly and tolerant of each other. She was well loved by most of the group. Most of them were her friends. Others, weren't. I was part of the others.

The reason why I mention this is because, it is important to consider this as part of this post. It helps me explain, how I was able to look at her without the rose-tinted glasses and without the several layers we tend to draw as a buddy, lover, relation, friend or wannabe.

It helped me get there faster. I didn't need lifting, you see.

Most of the time, behind her smile - lay this fragile frame of energy. It was almost as if she was drawing all that she could from her source to hold herself together. As a result, her mood swings were excessive. Holding it together must have really taken a toll on her on most days.

The drink sessions or the get-togethers after practice on some days, was an escape. Indulgent and rewarding to her. Balm like. During practice, we would have breaks, and I would see her gnawing at her finger-nails and nodding excessively as the director and production team briefed her on what was going on.

Sometimes, she would walk over to some of us and display paternalistic emotion, asking us if we were doing okay and if we were pumped. I wanted to ask her the same thing, I never really did though...I was scared she's collapse into a heap if I did.

Everyone was going on about how strong she was, how organised, how adept and how she was the only one holding it all together for the project. Self-serving? Maybe, but I also believe that they believed it when they said it. Either they didn't want to deal with what they saw or they didn't see it at all.

She hung herself on the eve of February 14. After a night of partying and a fight with her partner / husband. 20 minutes. He stepped out to buy cigarettes and calm down. She locked her self in and got it over with. She left no note.


In one of my earlier posts, I've indirectly (or directly) blogged about suicide. A self-reflection piece. Yes, I had a lot on my mind. And yes, I have thought about it. Several times. Have I tried to take my own life? No. Maybe, just maybe, I'm chicken. I'm working on a more refined response, but this is what I have so far.

I believe for the next few weeks, the friends and friends of friends must have sat up in shock and tried to play back the hours that led to this catastrophe. Till date, no one I know has come back with an explanation. The last I heard, they say her husband was put behind bars, as a murder suspect. Her family thinks he's responsible. Well, if that's anything to go by he's fucked, for awhile at least.

When I thought about it (suicide that is), I've often considered the inconvenience it would cause others. The messy business of walking the thin red line between what went wrong and what one didn't see and saving one's own ass; since this is an unnatural death, of course.

I've thought about loved ones going in for questioning, dealing with the body, the hunt for personal effects. The hiding of or playing down of the suicide by a landlord, especially when it comes to finding another tenant. If it's your own house, it's the case of the messy memories and scared younger generation, who will never consider sleeping in the room until their over 30 and sufficiently skilled in the whole concept of being balanced when it comes to negotiating childhood fears and family legend.

I think of the funeral and the curious gazes from people who only come to watch the survivors of the family break down piece by piece. And then proceed to eavesdrop on close family and see if they can piece a good enough story to spread out and quench THAT thirst which is never slaked. I think of the wake, the ground, the rotting. I think of how everyone will move on. Most without a scratch. Others with a reality check. And a precious few with their vitals performing below optimal.

What drove her to do it? What was it that snapped?

Was it reason? Was it meaning? Was it feeling?

What does it feel like when your brain shuts down and you're a countdown to self-destruction? Literally.

How do you fashion a knot that won't give through all that rushed and insane breathing? How do you manage it in time? Do you have an adrenaline rush, when you're trying to do this before someone can save you? Do you have the satisfaction of watching them crumble when they find you, eventually?

Was it fear of failure? Dissatisfaction? Lack of purpose? Was it revenge, served cold? Were you tired? Did it not matter any more? Any of it?

I think as lives extinguish around us. We'll never truly learn the answer to our questions. Everyone has a reason, valid enough for their misery or happiness. When you can't look misery in the eye because it's too ugly, you'll never truly accept who you really are. Cause we all want to be beautiful, the illusion of perfection is such an intravenous addiction.

Being happy is necessary. No doubt. But it's learning to be sad that we need to master. Irrevocably so, and once we have, we must own it. Own it like it's your own. Not someone else's. Feel it, let it wrangle with you, shake your bones and flood your system. Clench hard, focus and coil into a big ball. Die inside. Rising from the ashes is the easy part.

Die outside. And you won't.


Rise.

Insight

Over the past couple of months or so; I've had the opportunity to discuss several aspects of self-evolution with a good friend.

'Work-in-progress' may sound very intelligent, but to be honest it doesn't even begin to scratch the surface.

But that's what we are - work.in.progress.

It all began over a buffet lunch; when the jokes made way for serious banter and I found myself wallowing deep in what we call self-induced mull. My friend being a total sport joined in enthusiastically.

So while one group cracked up on the live entertainment and stuff memories are made of. She and I started sharing our personal anecdotes directly inspired from a book we're both reading (A New Earth).

Don't be fooled by it's OTT promise; the text is extremely heavy with what one can only begin to describe as 'prepared and peppered with extreme know-how'. So much so that the premise is simple - either you're ready or you're not. There's no in between.

A key point from our discussion is how every single act or reaction in our lives draws deeply from roots we almost always overlook or take for granted. Some of the stuff we always think we were too young to handle permeate through to adulthood for example.

It was quite a revelation when during a phone call recently the point was further broken down for me; when she asked me a rhetoric. Do you feel as if there are certain people or situations that seem to repeat itself constantly in your life? I had to agree there were. Definitely.

You keep meeting these people in your life; and you think you know them from somewhere or they remind of someone. You wouldn't have met this person your whole life, but the feeling or situations that come attached seem so familiar.

Unresolved in your mind. Unresolved in your present.

I guess letting go is easier said that done. I mean where would one start for example? Where would I even begin to unravel those very thoughts that now confound me when I need to make a choice, decision or even a step.

Most of go through life basing so much on a random event, occurrence or thought. Sometimes it becomes the very foundation of what we build our lives on. How many of us are paralysed by a fear, supposition or opinion or idea.

We're consumed by its familiarity, thrive in its warm softness and then can't seem to dip our toes into anything remotely different.

We blame our random event, we blame it till the cows home. We identify ourselves with it, we live it everyday, we colour our decisions with it. We wallow in it. We draw boundaries with it. for ourselves.

In my own little cosmos, I'd ideally like to stop the repeating waves of debilitating .

Let's just say off late I've been feeling two things; confusion and over a few events; nothing to drastic but nevertheless, enough to keep me 'knit-browed'. The second being disappointment; the realisation of a few universal truths (much like Murphy's law) has not been really kind in it revelation.

So in this particular stew I languish, slurping up every possible wave of gravy that accosts me. Smacking it down wondering anyone will throw me a bread stick so I can get outta here and to something.

Apoall pinne kanaam. Salut.