Below The Fold

It’s only cold right now

Mark killed himself.

I didn’t know Mark. He was someone I’d see in passing, little more than a nod and smile to on occasion. He seemed nice enough, and pleasant, too. In fact, I can think of no indication that he’d be the type.

The Type. Isn’t it funny how people who feel so completely marginalized that they have to kill themselves are simply embracing the isolation they’ve felt, but in this way, making it truly permanent? And it’s the fear of that permanence that drove them to it in the first place? And by “funny,” I mean “horribly sad.”

In Judaism, suicide prevents your burial in a blessed Jewish plot. In Christianity, it guarantees you a quick ticket to hell. Same thing in Islam (believe it or not, suicide bombing is not sanctioned by the Koran).

I try to think about how I’d feel if I knew Mark. I think I’d be really angry. I try to imagine someone close to me doing the same thing. It makes my stomach hurt.

I think about Mark’s mom. I wonder how she’ll face her neighbors at the funeral. I think about the wretched awkwardness that they’ll share. There will be accusatory stares—even if there aren’t, I’ll bet she’ll feel like there are—as people cluck their tongues and shake their heads and moan about how sad it all is.

Today it is cold. It’s so gray, and little tiny ice pellets are falling, collecting in a sheet on my windshield. I had to hack at it for 20 minutes this morning to clear off enough to see myself safely to work, breaking my ice-scraper in the process. It was like this yesterday, too, and they say it’ll be like this tomorrow.

But I know that sometime next week I’ll see the sun again, and I won’t need to wake up an extra 20 minutes early just to get to work on time. There won’t be a sheet of ice on the windshield, and little freezing pellets of ice won’t be falling from the sky.

I don’t think Mark knew that, though.