Category Archives: Suicide

Morning glories and scout

Newton’s town dump features a Swap Shop. You can find all manner of things there: cocktail glasses, lacrosse sticks, sweaters, baskets, small appliances. When we go to drop off items, the goal is to come away with less stuff than we give away. It can be a challenge.

This week we left behind: a stack of empty frames (all curb finds — easy); two big plastic bins (they were just hogging space in the garage — easy); a few duplicative kitchen tools (they were challenging the efficiency of drawers — good call); a butterfly house (we were never gonna hang it).

But! I came home with a 1,000 piece puzzle (saves me between $19 and $29 for the next fix), a beautiful glass bowl for the garden, a metal thing that I “planted” as structure for morning glories (see above), some vintage paper Santas mounted on wood (I know. I know), and a decorative wall candleholder.

The product below was the idea for the morning glories:

A portion of a dead tree provides support in another pot. That’s the root at top.

Immediately after writing the latest hand-wringing post, I got up to find that a framed picture of Danny had fallen over, taking with it the three puzzle pieces that had been leaning on it. One puzzle piece landed on the floor.

Hello Dan.

The piece that hit the deck was the lanky guy with a viewing device. A scout? A bird-watcher? Someone who can see farther than the naked eye for sure. Someone who can scan the horizon or examine distant treetops.

I took the sign to mean that Dan wants me to keep looking ahead, to enlarge the frame, to consider a wider perspective. This has a way of also meaning: go easy on yourself.

Thank you to everyone who liked that post or who left a comment (I did end up password protecting it, BTW). I didn’t offer replies, but I see and appreciate each and every one of you.

Acceptance, not

13 Replies

We sold his bike for $500

And I just want him back.

We gave away most of his books, the rest sit in piles in his old room

And I just want him back.

We sent the student loan people his death certificate and canceled the credit cards and subscriptions and stopped automatic renewals —

every transaction proof of life.

Gone.

Beautiful indigo-dyed linen now cloaks the box of his ashes — cloth embroidered with his name and birth and death dates.

“Danny, March 16, 1996–2026.”

No decisions about service or gravesite. There’s a big emptiness there — one that usually doesn’t matter. We are two lapsed Catholics who never adopted an alternate tradition.

People who might come are spread all over the country or dead themselves. And what is this town to me? To his father or brother?

And anyway, I don’t really want a stone or a lovely service

I just want him back.

We’ll sell his car in June for 10 or 12 grand and I could care less.

I just want him back.

We’ve downloaded all his photos to the computer and someday I’ll look but not now, definitely cannot look now.

I took screenshots of some playlists on Spotify before cancellation, but I can’t listen, not now.

I just want him back.

I write about him every day and say his name, Danny, Danny, Danny, but am I supposed to be satisfied with the ephemeral when I can still recall his thick hair and beautiful skin and handsome smile? That almost loping walk?

He has no body now.

It was often windy in Longmont in early March, so now it’s as if the wind here harasses me — no longer a result of temperature and pressure but rather a cruel reminder of those final haunted hours.

Don’t get me started on train whistles.

He’s never, ever coming back.

I don’t need to be happy ever again. That’s not it.

I just want him back.

PS I know it’s too early to even contemplate acceptance. I know it’s too early to get past my sense of responsibility. Danny’s death is still so very, very shocking. The rawness of this grief colors everything right now. But I know that down the road, things will look different.

PPS I cried watching the last Colbert show. What are we even doing?