Actually, I had no direct contact with this bizarre (understatement) death,
suicide, or perhaps we could call it a murder. I see that the murderer was the
murdered in this case.
I was told about this case by an instructor/professor I had in college. At the time
I heard this tale, I was studying forensics. I switched to law enforcement almost
as soon as I passed two weeks into the chemistry. Anyhow, I took this course in
criminal investigation. Dr. Quarles had a lot of stories, I don't remember any of
his other stories burning this sort of an image. Well, perhaps the one about the
guy strapped to a board placed perpendicular to a train track. The top portion of
his skull lying across the path of a train's steel wheels. That one made an
impression since the image of his eyes straining to see the oncoming train was
easy to construct in my morbid loving mind.
This one is vivid too. I sort of hope it is true.
The murdered man in this example of the varieties of death was a husband. I
picture a man who had been married about fifteen or twenty years of his
forty-five years. He still lived in the same house he and his wife bought soon
after they said their vows of eternal devotion. Nightly, he kept a quiet, practiced
vigil in the living room's only easychair. Actually, it was an uncomfortable chair
at best. In the meantime, she cleared the dinner dishes to a sink full of bleach
water to soak. The remains of dinner were disposed of in a sack that went to the
alley garbage can every single night of the marriage. She wiped out and
bleached his lunch pail too. Then, used a solution of disinfectants on any
kitchen surface she could stretch her wiry arms to reach.
The husband read the paper while keeping his feet planted on the floor in front
of the chair. Every single night, he would crave a glass of water (due to the
briny dinner)while reading that paper. However, there were rules. You know,
like no food outside of the kitchen. Certainly, no drinking in the living room. So,
he would finish the paper, carefully fold it under his arm and rise as she came in
to start her next ritual. That included smoothing the fabric of the easychair,
sweeping the porch he walked across each night on his way out to pick up the
yard, and vacuuming the room as she backed into her next ritual. In the
meantime, he hand-carried any yard scraps to the back door, placed them in the
mostly empty garbage bag from the kitchen and walked to the alley. Finished
with what was really another one of her rituals, he'd go to the garage and fiddle
with any device that acted as if it might need to be adjusted.
So, I imagine this going on year after year.
It bores me just to think of this year after year. "And twenty more years slip
away." I suppose that he was smart to adopt the passive acceptance of life as
having no major surprises. Perhaps, he was, like many of the rest of us,
comfortable in the ordinary day-to-day activities involved in living. Daily, he
hears her noises. Predictable nagging, disappointment and harassing
statements met his ears that appeared deaf. According to her, all his faults
made life so difficult. I can imagine her belief, "If only he would..." Well, this Joe
is meek and mild. The sort who will inherit the earth.
His job is a good one. He is pleasant to all. His co-workers go to him when they
need something. And this Joe does his best to give them what they need. She
is totally forgotten in his daytime life. Later, at home, he is yapped at
unceasingly.
This misery seems to be her fault, doesn't it? I suppose it depends on who is
talking. He could stand up for himself. He could tell her off or he might consider
that he is letting her get away with the noise.
Back to the misery. He sits in it nightly. He takes it in every evening in that
maroon velvet chair. He has made the impression of his backside stick there to
remind her every single day although he is physically not in her domain for ten
hours, he remains there in her place. She can't erase him even for those ten
hours a day, five days a week. Her life that includes her rituals. Her life that is
that house and her things.
So, another night and he's there again, dragging his feet across he porch. He
hits the door and she hears him find his way to her stairs. The supper is boiling
madly on the stove. She sets the table with the same stainless they have used
since they came home from their honeymoon weekend to the mountains.
Supper is on the table. Twenty minutes of sitting in the stiffest seats to touch
anyone's backside. Chomp of teeth endlessly making mash of the string roast.
She tells him she needs to get some potatoes for the meatloaf on Tuesdays.
"Uh huh," he says as he stretches his neck to keep his eye on the newscast.
Each and every night he does this as he nears the end of his plate. Then, it's
back to his chair and the springs squeak.
I can hear them both screaming every night within in their own skulls. Then, we
go to the nightly ritual aforementioned.
And this is his birthday. Beside his breakfast plate is an envelope. The card
she got him is simple. "Happy Birthday. Love, Your Wife." Breakfast finished
and the crumbs up before he can rise. He is out the door to his office.
Today, work is like every other. He finishes the morning sheets and walks to the
cooler for his 10:15 break. He hears a conversation.
"Ole guy's gotta be close to retiring." "There is a chance that he could go this
year since we are putting all the books on spreadsheet. He won't even touch his
computer to do a memo," he heard Mr. Clighborn say with a chuckle to the
newest guy.
Mr. Clighborn is the top guy in his department. They have lunch every
Thursday. Every Thursday since they were hired. Then, they were the same
age. Now, it seems as if he has aged two additional decades. He felt old, real
old. Five o'clock comes and he is out the door, to the car, and to the house.
He walks across the porch one last time. He is tired. Her smell hits him when
He opens the front door. The disinfectant mingles with the burnt meat she offers
every single night. His stainless steel fork hits the plate at each stab of leather.
Tonight, he spits out the pieces into a napkin. Finished, he takes the napkin of
chewed meat to the trash and he is out the door. After picking up the yard, he
comes in to sit in that horrible chair one last time.
One last time, she walks in to the living room and starts her tirade. He meets
her again with deaf ears. Actually, we find out that they weren't so deaf.
Anyhow, the story is that he walked into the kitchen and grabbed the sandwich
knife that was given to them as a wedding gift of knives from Mr. Clighorn, his
friend. His only friend gave him the entire set as a congratulations for setting up
what was meant to be a happy home. It was just a house.
The knives were kept very sharp according to her orders. As sharp as a razor
slicing though butter was what he discovered.
He took the knife, the evening news, and a paper sack upstairs. In the room that
she had begun to occupied about five years into their marriage (once they
discovered that there would be no children), he laid the sack on her dresser. He
stood in front of the mirror, removed his shirt and began to cut his way out of the
prison.
The ordinary Joe sliced into his stomach, removed his guts, literally and placed
them in the sack. Of course, he bled. He bled all over the floor. At some point,
he took his right index finger and extended it into the pool of blood at his feet.
With a wet finger for this message, he wrote her a note. "CLEAN THIS UP
BITCH!"
Imagine that, the man murdered, himself albeit, put himself out of his misery and
retaliated all at the same time with just a few quick slices to his sensitive gut. I
loved that story. Happy Birthday.
MORNING
How do I explain never waking up again? Most of me died three days ago.
There is no other way to put it. I went to my own funeral. I watched the two and
a half foot, white casket lower into the ground. I picked that small, hard white
box out of a basically hidden room that held similar boxes solely for the eyes of
parents. That is where they took us to choose the last bed our child has forever.
Only people like me know about that room. For the rest of my life, I will know of
that room and the dead feeling during the choice. I will know the dead feeling
forever after.
As the casket lowered, my dreams of a little girl were buried along with the pink
satin lace lining. I felt the rest of me die. I felt lowered into the dirt with my girl.
I felt closed into that box. I felt that I was no longer free and alive. I felt asleep,
real and in a horrible dream.
When I was a little girl, I had fantasies and dreams. One was that I was going to
be a doctor. I suppose so that I would command unquestioned respect. Also, I
said that I would never marry or have children. I was tough, I thought. I was
saying that I had no need to nurture. I turned out to be tough and soft.
When I was about five, I was given a Madame Alexander doll. She awakened
my need to nurture. I named her Kimbie, after a child who lived across the
street. I was fascinated with that family of three girls. They were so feminine.
We played in the same dirt piles and none of them ever got dirty. I carried the
pile home with me. They seemed to float atop the dirt, while, I was always in the
middle of it. They came out to play with ribbons in their hair, ballet slippers on
their feet, and sweet little buns at the napes of their scrubbed necks. They
matched. I felt like a wrinkled mess.
The two oldest were twins, three or four years-old. The younger was about
eighteen months old. She was Kimbie. Their mother was Norwegian and the
girls looked like tiny dolls that matched her. The girls and their mother always
seemed to wear coordinating clothing. They simply belonged together.
I think this was when my desire to have that softness was born. The softness of
being female smelled like light sleep all powdered and smooth. The girls
smelled that way. I loved that family.
I recall only wanting to wear dresses or tennis shorts during my childhood. I
longed for female- all female clothes.
However, I believed that I would have to be masculine in order to have any of my
mother's respect. I never got my mother's respect since I was always a female.
I never could get away from the inateness of my gender. In ways, I seem more
female that many of my female friends.
It never mattered that I did many of the things that men of her age did in order to
support their families. That I could be considered their equal. I never gained or
was given her admiration or respect. I suppose, I was actually a threat. I was
more of a woman that she could ever be. Also, I was more of a man that she
would ever have. I was what my mother was not. I was completely responsible
for myself. Eventually, I became responsible for another person. I sought to be
responsible for this tiny girl who came from me.
During a brief marriage, I became pregnant. It was as if I had done it alone,
though. I felt no connection to that man who was my spouse. But I welcomed
the thought that I could nurture this part of myself. Years before, I had ended a
pregnancy because I felt incapable. This time, I knew that I would kill a piece of
myself if I repeated an abortion.
So, I chose to Be Pregnant. It was so delicious. I felt so female. I loved the
softness I felt throughout my body. God, I felt so great. I fell in love with myself.
I fell in love with the little girl I knew I would have. I didn't care that I was the
only one there to raise her. I felt. And I knew that I would be okay.
I had Melanie on the most beautiful day of the year. Nothing could be more
perfect. I brought her home and we lay for hours in our bed. She nursed herself
to sleep for nine weeks. I smelled her constantly for nine weeks. You know how
tiny her hands were. She was so soft and of course, delicate is the only word I
know to describe her. She was beautiful. I was filled with feeling about her. I
would stroke her cheeks. I would hold her body and feel her still a part of me. I
would feel her firm differences too. Love was so much a part of me for those two
months I had her.
Those two months I believe will define the rest of my life. I will hold up all
experiences to those two months of pure innocence that I had with my Melanie.
The most horrible day of my life unfolded like a dream that held me asleep and
too groggy to wake to morning. There was no morning that day. It was the first
morning that ended every fresh morning to come for the rest of my life.
I noticed her stillness. She had never been still since the day I knew that she
was a part of me. She was a living part of me since I met my baby, my Kimbie.
This morning, she was totally separate from me. I was seeing an object, an
inanimate object. That knowledge was followed by an unbelievable weight in my
gut. I felt her separate from me. She was still and cold. Her tiny cheeks were
gray-blue. Her skin felt like clay against my hands that grabbed her in shock.
My God, my girl was dead. I was dead. Even when I went to my mother's
funeral, I hadn't felt this sort of grief. I knew then that I was alive. Today, I knew
that I was dead.
I don't know how I did a thing. I don't have any idea how I made the steps that
got me to the funeral home to pick out the casket I later watched lower with my
girl into the ground. I don't have any idea how I let go of her to be placed in that
box. How did I stand there while my acquaintances filed by to say how sorry
they felt? I didn't feel a thing when anyone voiced their parts during that
procession. I don't recall any of their faces. All I saw was her face, still, in my
arms.
I heard Steve Winwood singing " We all want one more morning just to feel it all
again. Just to have this day and life starting all over for all it may bring the
blessing on everything... In the arms we were born in. In the arms that will take
us home. We all want one more morning. Then we'll take the night to come."
I'll never have one more morning. I don't want to take the night to come. Thank
you for the thought Stevie.
STABS
Dear Stabber:
My death came following seventeen stabs. Seventeen sharp wounds to my
body. That number doesn't reflect the times you entered me over and over. It
doesn't count the slices I gave myself (as your proxy). By the way, there were
more than twenty-five. Most were what law enforcement people call defense
wounds. I fought. The last six or seven did the trick.
I'm writing this in order to absolve you of guilt for my death. Yeah, I'm saying
that I give up the debt. You no longer owe me. Now, try to get out of your
prison.
I've read over and over that you have changed your life in the years since you
soul-murdered me. I understand that you found Jesus. Congratulations, so
many have looked for Him but actually found themselves deaf to His calling. You
found Him so soon after you began your search. Yee, Ha. Oops, I'm becoming
catty. I don't mean to.
Do you think about what you did? What do you recall? What were you thinking
at the time?
I ask you again, were you considering anything that night you pulled your long
knife?
What made you choose me? Did I just look like someone you wanted to kill,
stab, murder, or rape? I've thought about it again and again and again. What
if? What if? What if? I had worn something different? I had walked down
another street? I had a gun?
Would you have attacked me then? Would you have found me an irresistible
victim to your force? Would you have found someone else? Would I have been
able to pull the trigger on your blue eyes?
Well, I won't count the number of slices you gave me as the sole reason for my
death. Those seventeen weren't the first. You weren't the first to steel my soul.
It was tempered long ago. I tell you that my father did it, my neighbor, my
brother all before. So, you see, I suppose you adding your measly seventeen
wasn't that big of a deal. Actually it was. I'll go ahead and forgive you of the
debt. You don't owe me a thing.
It's just that after years and years of being stabbed and entered against my will,
your seventeen did the trick. They sent me over the edge. Your entry into my
quiet little life sent me over the edge. I didn't have any wings so that I could fly
far far away.
I made the decision when you got to me that I would stay alive until I saw you
suffer the same fate. I fought for weeks in that hospital bed. I struggled to keep
breathing while I lay exposed in that alley. I left the fragile me when I knew that I
could not escape from underneath your heavy, brutal body. I hung around
hoping that I would be able to return to my body and live again. I never could.
The rain poured on me after you left. It washed away your scent but not the
taste of my blood and your semen in my mouth. The rain kept witnesses away.
That poor man who found me all laid out with private parts on display. That poor
man who saw me on the ground. Perhaps you should apologize to him. He
didn't deserve to be a victim, too.
Like I was telling you, you weren't the first or even the best. I was left to believe
that abuse was all there is in a relationship when I was young. I tried to prove
that wrong several times during my lifetime. I want some credit for those acts of
bravery. I will get none. That is a fact.
I tried to give relationships a chance time after time. Instead, I got people filled
with rage. I needed a little tenderness. Instead, I got stabs from each man I got
with. I learned to live without. Now, I'll learn not to live. I just have to convince
my body that it is time to die.
I'll give my body a little help. Valium and vodka are a great combination. They
will soothe the wounds. They will give me a sleep that I have not had in 34
years. They will be able to convince the body that held my soul, it is dead.
So, I hope that this information is helpful to you. Does it help you to give
yourself forgiveness for your crime against nature? Good luck in your God
sanctioned life that you have left to live.
Actually, I will petition Him personally for your sins. I will include a copy of this
letter with my plea to Him to set you free of any punishment. I hope that you can
make the most of your pardon.
Hope to quit seeing you in dark alleys.
cc: God
Home
Lyrics
Intro
Leg
LINKS