Close Encounters

I was thinking about the movie, Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind. I got it, just this week, what it is about, at least, what it is about, for me. I love the scenes when the strangers connect as they share these bizarre visions and experiences. And, their connection is very intimate, more intimate than any other relationship they have. I got it. That is what it feels like being a survivor of suicide. When I am in a room of other survivors, I let my guard down and we get right down to it, what it is that connects us and how, in many ways, we are the aliens. We are aliens on this planet, and will never blend in. But, it is ok, because we have one another.

For those people that arne't survivors, there is no way that they understand. I mean, how could they? There is the attempt to find fault, or reason for such a final act. Their life was just beginning, or, they seemed on top of the world, they had everything going for them.....no, they didn't. No, they didn't. No, they really didn't.

And, no, you don't really have it all together, you really aren't on top of the world, when the rest of the world thinks you are. You appear that way. We want you to look that way. But, your brain is going haywire, too, when no one is looking. It happens. The brain is a very powerful organ and we don't even know how it works.

I guess I am a lucky one, because, I knew that my husband was struggling. I would see a flower, he would see the dirt. I saw a blue sky, he felt emptiness. He never said those things, but, you feel that with your partner. You feel their pain. He was an alien, with no sense of hope and a constant realization of the absence of all happiness.

What is hard about surviving suicide is knowing that suicide happened. Here is a person that took that next step into darkness and ended it. They ended their pain, but we are left with this big mess. More confusion, more anger, more rage, more sadness. And, a lot of guilt.

I read somewhere today that a person described their loved one who died by suicide as being so courageous. I guess it is courageous continuing to operate as one thing but feeling dead on the inside. Is that courage? I don't know. I guess what bothers me, is that it's not as if it will always be that way, and that there is no resource to help. On the outside of the internal hell, are drugs and therapy and more importantly, relationships. Relationships with other aliens, for example. On a planet of 6 billion, you can't be alone. It's an impossibility. But, you have to move outside of yourself.