Ode to Another Billy Joe

 

        A few weeks ago, one of my coworkers committed suicide by jumping off a bridge. I use the word coworker very loosely. He was not a part of the pharmacy staff so I didn't interact with him. I saw him a lot around the store. He was kind of hard to miss as he had the longest hair I have ever seen on a man along with facial hair to match.

        What I do know is that he was a dependable and well liked by everyone. When he didn't call or show up to work, people were concerned. This lead to a search which found his car parked with his phone and ID in it. There was a note in his apartment. 

        He wasn't found right away. Some of the people who knew him thought that maybe he ran away. Maybe he was in Las Vegas or some where getting away from it all. They didn't want to believe that he was really gone and that he had killed himself. I don't blame them. It's a hard thing to process.

    He was found a few days ago, near a bridge just outside of a local town.. I sometimes drove on that bridge when traffic is backed up on the bridge I normally take. I drove on it the day he was found. This time I took a good look at it. 

    Clearly this was something he thought about. This bridge didn't have a lot of foot traffic and depending on the time of day no one would see him. It's a high enough bridge that he wouldn't survive a fall from it. There was a long walk from places to park to the bridge. I wondered what he was thinking as he walked. 

     The people left behind are terribly hurt and it doesn't really heal. I've learned from personal experience that you get used to it. You learn to live with it. If you were the last person to speak to someone who committed suicide as I was once, you also learn to live with the nagging thought that maybe you could have stopped them or maybe you said the wrong thing at the wrong time. Because of this, I used to think that suicide was an act of unparalleled selfishness. 

    I no longer think that. As someone who dealt with suicidal thoughts sometimes as an adult, it isn't so simple. Sometimes things are just so painful that death seems to be the only way out. There are so many things that can go on in someone's head that are not expressed to others. 

    I know that my coworker's soul is out there somewhere. I hope he has found comfort wherever he is, that he could not find here on earth.