I

NOT, I’ll not, carrion comfort, Despair, not feast on thee;
Not untwist—slack they may be—these last strands of man
In me or, most weary, cry I can no more. I can;
Can something, hope, wish day come, not choose not to be.
Gerard Manley Hopkins

Where I lived there are still many trees and much undergrowth. It was hot and insects were at the top of the food chain. It was flatland and low and wet and all the streams and lakes were muddy. The fish couldn’t see six inches in the water. There were no vistas. My life in the Williams family was contained in this jungle and I never saw beyond the moment. So, one day in May, before it was really hot and wet, I killed myself.

I thought dying would be easier than what I had to face. There was no time to think. I thought I had killed my wife and a man from across the street who was trying to stop me. I ran over Christie twice with my Dodge Van. I ran over him once. Then, I fled as fast as I could drive and I took the baby with me. I called Dad. I told him what I had done. I asked him to tell my children that I loved them and to say that it was over for me. He told me to take the baby somewhere and leave her and not to hurt her. He had seen all of my disasters and whatever I did or said did not surprise him. I hung up. I went to my aunt Irma’s and gave Betty to her. I told Irma I was not going to be taken by the police. I went to my car, got my bottle of hydracodone, went to the water hose and took the whole bottle of pills. Irma called 911. I ran into the woods behind her house.

I had lived on Irma’s property when I was five years old and played there many times afterward. I knew that jungle, its trails and its woods. There was a wide easement next to Irma’s house cut through that thicket for power lines. I ran down that easement toward the San Jacinto River for about two miles until I came to a large drainage pipe. I could not go further, so I crawled into the pipe. I knew that the cops would never find me there. In fact, I doubted they would ever look. I felt safe. I fell asleep. I had no idea my body would never awaken and that my mind would never sleep.

When morning came, I was looking at my body in that drainage pipe. I’m not sure that I knew I was dead. I kept expecting to go back into my body and pick myself up, but I just looked at it. There was no feeling and there was no movement. There was no resurrection. I was alone and I was stuck in a place I had not planned to be, a place where I did not expect to spend eternity.

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