Suburban Goddess

I spoke to my father yesterday, who had spent the day with his best friend. It was the anniversary of the death of his son. The boy was sixteen years old, the third and final son of a prominent doctor. He had everything he ever wanted; as the baby, he was spoiled rotten. I remember watching the boy grow from a pudgy-faced toddler to a tall, handsome teen.

Five years ago, I received a phone call while camping with Chip & some friends. My father had been trying to reach me for over 48 hours; Danny had committed suicide. His father had an extensive gun collection, and occasionally pulled one out in his personal indoor firing range. Danny had taken one of the pistols, gone down into the firing range, and shot himself in the head right below the family home. His suicide note was angry and vengeful; it wasn’t the letter of the boy we all knew. My father took on the task of cleaning the room where Danny died; it was too much for the family to endure.

So every year, on the anniversary of Danny’s death, my father has called me. I don’t know if it is a conscious effort, or if he’s just thankful that he doesn’t have to endure that kind of grief and subconsciously needs to hear his baby’s voice. I know that he we hung up the phone, and I thought about the loss that his friend has to live with, suddenly my problems didn’t seem quite so huge.

I reached for Alex and held her tightly.

This entry was posted on January 8, 2007 at 1:57 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.