Dreams and Memories

Warning – graphic discussion of suicide.

The other night I had what I can only describe as a semi-dream. I’m fairly sure I was asleep, and dreaming, but everything in my dream actually happened. It was like having one long, vivid, memory. It was a memory of the night I tried to commit suicide, more than 10 years ago.

Nothing earth-shattering in remembering that. Obviously, my feeble attempt at slicing my wrists didn’t get anywhere near deep enough, and the other options available to me mostly involved jumping or driving off a cliff along the Pacific Coast Highway, but I was very much afraid of failing in that and ending up paralyzed or something. On the other hand, I woke up with a real sense of fright. Not fright of making another attempt, but fright of what might have been. I can look back now and see that I was not solving anything, and the attempt was a huge mistake that I’ve since overcome. If I had been successful, I wouldn’t have what I have now, there would be no looking back.

That night would have been the end of my journey. How many journeys ended the same way, and how many people never got to look back? I was close to being one of them. I’m glad I wasn’t.