(TW: Suicide, depression)
Clark was beautiful and charming. When I say beautiful I mean a heartthrob. A real heart-breaker.
He loved to work out; lifting weights and building muscle.
At sixteen he’d lived more of a life than a lot of people at sixty. He’d seen more, been exposed to more, and had more than enough heartache.
His father was a looker too. A body builder. A dope head. He’d gone to prison when Clark was just seven.
The other kids at school teased him unmercifully about his jail-bird daddy. What do seven-year-olds know about jail-birds? They probably just parroted whatever they heard their mamas and daddies saying.
Clark found a way to deal with the bullying. He found a hand-gun underneath his grandmother’s bed. He slipped that hand-gun into his back pack and took it to school. When the kids picked on him again he took that gun out of his back pack.
He pointed it at them and then at the teacher who tried to stop him. The gun was loaded. The only thing that stood between a seven-year-old and revenge was the safety.
At seven he was promptly expelled from the public school system in that county. None of the parents wanted Clark in a class with their kids.
His crack-head of a mother made a half-hearted attempt to keep him in some kind of school. But out of work and a convicted felon, herself, she struggled to even get out of bed in the mornings. She couldn’t afford a private school and other public schools in the area hesitated.
For a while he managed to stay in school, even scoring a spot on the football team. When he got caught selling drugs at school that ended that. Expelled again.
Perhaps he shouldn’t have been selling drugs but at thirteen, most likely, he didn’t have a choice. Not one that he saw anyway. A thirteen-year-old needs to eat. A thirteen-year-old providing for his mother.
By the time he was sixteen he’d lived an entire lifetime. He was trying to get his life together. He’d gotten legitimate work in construction and was quite talented for it.
One brisk November night, two days before Thanksgiving, he and some friends had a bonfire. By all accounts they were having a good time. Clark waxed serious and cryptic, muttering something about there having to be more to life. He decided to go to bed.
Minutes later his friends heard the loud shot ring out. They ran inside to find the door to Clark’s room locked. He wouldn’t answer. He couldn’t answer. By the time they broke the door down he was gone. The shot-gun he’d lodged in his open mouth lying next to him on the floor.
We never know the pain of another. I’ve always mourned the loss of a life so full of potential. Clearly he didn’t see it that way. He didn’t see anything better. I’m sorry for that. I’m sorry his pain was so deep he could not bear it. And I’m sorry we were oblivious to it. Blindsided.
August 14, 2014 at 11:08 am
Speechless.
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August 14, 2014 at 11:13 am
As were we all. This was six years ago. It’s seared into my memory.
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August 14, 2014 at 11:15 am
I can imagine.
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August 14, 2014 at 1:36 pm
I, too, am speechless!
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August 14, 2014 at 5:12 pm
Sometimes there are no words, eh?
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August 18, 2014 at 5:34 am
And this is one of those times. Words wouldn’t be enough. Maybe a hug would speak more
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August 14, 2014 at 12:11 pm
My God. So much pain, so many obstacles. My heart breaks.
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August 14, 2014 at 5:11 pm
Indeed. 😦
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August 14, 2014 at 2:03 pm
I…. *sigh*.
I’m sorry.
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August 14, 2014 at 5:13 pm
Such a tragic short life.
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August 14, 2014 at 7:02 pm
(((hugs))) ❤
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August 15, 2014 at 4:29 pm
{{{HUGS}}}
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August 15, 2014 at 2:41 am
Depression sucks. Great post Ruth. 😀 ♥ Hugs ♥
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August 15, 2014 at 11:29 am
Thanks, Sonel. Yes, it does. *hugs* to you too!
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August 15, 2014 at 6:20 am
I’ve had three friends commit suicide. I also once had a casual friend, more like an acquaintance, who killed himself one night in the apartment under mine. Consequently suicide is a painful subject for me. I like to see compassion, for those who are left behind and for the memory of those who choose to leave us on their own terms. Maybe we do the memory of those who do commit suicide
a bit of a disservice by trying to frame their circumstances into a nice, tidy picture. Life seem inevitably complex and every human psyche is unique. It’s just so very sad when someone reaches their limit.
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August 15, 2014 at 11:31 am
Maybe we do the memory of those who do commit suicide a bit of a disservice by trying to frame their circumstances into a nice, tidy picture.
It’s human nature, I guess, to want to know the why of it all and try to pinpoint something in particular. Life just doesn’t work that way, though. It’s rarely, if ever, that neat. Life is messy and complicated. Taking one’s own is surely even moreso.
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August 15, 2014 at 7:14 am
Totally numb.
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August 15, 2014 at 11:32 am
Mind boggling, isn’t it? The lives that some live and others are forced to live without a choice in the matter?
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August 15, 2014 at 11:38 am
There are always going to be people that fall through the cracks.
On the face of it, Robin Williams had it all. But probably felt he had nothing,( not material) stuff ) such was his despair (I assume)
And then there’s this kid … ( and lots like him)
Is there an answer? Beats me, Ruth.
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August 15, 2014 at 11:55 am
Oh, sure. Mental illness and depression know no bounds. I’ve known rich people who were in the depths of despair and kids like this one who whistled while they worked.
I don’t know if there’s an answer either.
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August 19, 2014 at 5:18 am
I can’t think of any suicides of people I’ve known, so I have no conception of what it must be like to know someone and find they’ve killed themselves. The nearest to that was a death by misadventure, when the local mayors son had a noose around himself while masturbating and, like others, it went badly wrong. I covered the inquest. Amazing what you learn in journalism 😦
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September 3, 2014 at 11:20 am
I don’t know how I missed this comment.
This young man was my step-daughter’s half-brother. I’d had him in my home several times. 😦
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September 16, 2014 at 6:25 pm
Ruth-
It’s a heartbreaking story….suicide lingers, in my experience. The unanswered questions of why? Could I have done something?…always make this sort of death especially hard.
Even more so for a young man who had overcome so much….I’m sorry this happened to your family 😦
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September 27, 2014 at 12:09 pm
Thanks, CA. It’s haunting, isn’t it? The questions, the what ifs….
I don’t know anyone who suicide hasn’t touched in some way or another.
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