Survival

Sometimes, well, too often I walk into the middle of something big without meaning to. 

I try to figure out what God, the universe, the saints, my mother would want me to learn and I get exhausted.

I decided in 2005 to not take on any more potential suicides.

Suicidal people gravitate toward me as if I were the beacon of light at the end of the tunnel.

They tell me they feel well when they are around me. 

Calm and something that resembles happiness washes over them. 

I make them laugh.

But I am not a pill.

I am not a one-way mirror.

On the other side of their calm is a woman who wants to talk about the weather.

The last one, in 2007, called me at midnight to ask if I would go for a drink with him. 

This was on a Wednesday, I had to be at work at 8:30 the next morning, I don't drink and I had no intention of climbing so deeply into his insanity. 

I had spoken to him about simple things and he thought I was gentle and kind.

This made him want to follow me around.

I had to think of my own survival - giving his family very clear advice.

HAVE HIM COMMITTED OR HE WILL KILL HIMSELF.

I was told that was a terrible thing that they could never do.

Six months later, he killed himself.