Open Letter to H
Now Playing: Just Like You By Three Days Grace
Topic: Family Business

Look you stupid motherfucker, what the fuck do you think you're doing? copping out? don't you dare even think about it. You made your choices just like I did & everyone else. first of all your kids need a father, maybe not the way they did when they were 2 or 5 or even 15 but they do need a dad, I was 23 when my father blew his brains out (you helped me clean them up in front of the barn for heavens sake) & I know this for a fact there's not a day that goes by that I don't think of something I'd like to get his opionion or advice or input on. I have had to deal with not 2 but 3 suicides if you remember my brother in law D hung himself at 14. & I think I'm pretty qualified to speak on this subject. I also have the insight of living with the family depression & dark periods that I've watched you, my mother, brother & cousins deal with too. it can be overcome (st Johns wort has done wonders for me-I'm only sorry I couldn't have taken it sooner but with childbearing, nursing & birth control to keep me from it I had no real choice) But drugs or herbs are not the only answer, you have to work at not getting taken up by it, & I don't mean throwing yourself into a work schedule that allows no time for reflection. What about Eddie, didn't he have a life in NYC that he left to go to California with you? so you'd just strand him there? Suicide is a very selfish act. think about your kids J&J at your funeral, think about E, M & all my cousins ( Not to mention myself & my kids) I understand wanting to go home. (though I admit I'm not exactly interested in doing so- too expensive, too crowded & too cold- & I don't mean the weather only) Also, do you really want L to have the last laugh? if he outlives you he would do so & you know it as well as I do. I hear there was something about a poor reference from someone you expected to give you a good reference, I don't know who that was but I have some ideas, so that cost you the job in B, well there'll be other jobs, they're not showing you the door in California are they? if it's not time for you to go home then things won't work out for it, if you're trying to force it it just won't come, I know that sounds like so much hippie mumbo jumbo to you & I'm aware you think I'm a silly bitch but believe me in a lot of ways I've been the best friend you've got, I've been in situations where if I had spilled things I knew you could have been privately & publicly embarrased, I don't mean when I was an adult either (though there were plenty of times then too) I've known since I was 14 that you're at the least bisexual & the only people who knew it then were the guys themselves & M (as far as I can tell) I have had a lot of arguments with P about homosexuality being inherited & seen red at her insistence that it was all the mother's fault, when I knew her most precious, favorite son (face it, you are) was gay. & I bit my tounge every time. I never let on at all although I admit that when she told me about your divorce & how M made you tell her about why you were divorcing I did tell her I had known about you for a LONG time. Still though, you've made it this far, you don't even have grandchildren yet for crying out loud - do you know how hard it is to explain a grandfather who's not there to little kids? I do, none of my kids remember their grandfather at all- the only grandfather they know of or remember is H B- is that a good role model?, Do you ever do anything for yourself? like garden, or read fiction, or paint or draw or go to a concert or just do something you feel like doing not what you should be doing etc. I work in a high stress environment myself & so I indulge myself on my days off, I sit around & browse on the computer, read till 2 am, paint & do other crafts have a vegetable garden & just generally do what I want while my kids are at school. (I also cook dinner, clean the house & do laundry in between but I've always been a good multi tasker) There's very little which is worth dying for & depression isn't one of the few things which are worth it. you've been to counseling & phyciatry before for heavens sake, go again, find something, come here & hike the blue ridge parkway, go to maine & do the whole appalachians instead of only some of them like you already have. hike cross country, go to the beach & learn how to surf, you're living on the right coast for it for chrissake. listen to the new music out there, linkin park, stained, godsmack (they're from methuen even) why give up? there's too much out there to do that. here's some more hippie bullshit but it's what I belive & what kept me from taking all the pills in the house during my teen years: If you kill yourself because of what you're dealing with in this life, in your next life you're going to have the same problems & have to try to live thru them & over come them all over again & you'll just keep repeating the same lessons untill you get it right wouldn't you rather suffer thru this life with the hope of the next one being better? That gave me hope back in the days I was dark.(& there were many many of those- right after my father died along with the teen years) there's also the stigma of suicide, do you want your kids to have to tell people: My father killed himself? it makes people look at you in a whole different way, like if someone close to you has killed themselves, you must be unhinged too... I don't tell anyone unless there's a good reason to do so. There's a terrible stigma to it still. I've had people be really rude about it too. I wouldn't wish what I've been thru on my worst enemy & certainly not on people I love as much as I love J&J. I hope you realize what an impression on your son especially you are, (I haven't seen your daughter in years & we do have some issues too) But I got to talk to your son in depth in 2002 & was very impressed at what a together, adult, responsible 18 year old he was then (it was july) & he told me he barely remembered his mother from his childhood, she was the ogre in the bedroom asleep that you had to tiptoe around. he remembered you & P & I raising him, not his mom so I would pat yourself on the back for that one & focus on your kids in spite of their adulthood. talk to my mother if you have to. she can tell you horror stories of the after math of suicide after all that's what she does is help people clean up afterwards, (emotionally at least) Look, I don't have any answers here either, I get frustrated, paranoid, worried & emotional myself but I know there's plenty to life & that seeking to end life is irresponsible & selfish. You & only you choose how you're going to meet life's challenges & if you make a consious effort to really be present in your every day life it can help you get through anything. I walked through my seperation with Rick with him moving in with a 19 year old with a bigger ass than mine, a shaved head & snaggle teeth right in the same town of 520 that I lived in & I held my head up through the gossip, laughter & embarassment of the whole thing, I took a job in the nursing home as a housekeeper & I focused on really seeing the elderly people there & talking to them, even if I got back giberish they at least knew someone responded to their giberish. & I work hard everyday to make sure that every call I take the person will remember me even if they're pissed at me for what I have to tell them about the company I work for's business policys they will remember that I was calm, courteous & as kind as possible about the whole thing & as I go from one awful call to the next pissed off customer I have learned to mentally shake the last one off before I take on the next one so my annoyance at the idiot who couldn't figure out where the select button on their remote was does not cary over to the person who's pissed because someone's ordered 120 $ worth of porn..
Find something anything at all that takes you out of yourself & makes you forget about your problems.