Incident At the Sonic Drive-In

There’s something humbling about going to the Sonic Drive-In on foot. The Hyundai-jockeys all around you stare like you’re some kind of novelty. Which, in a way you are – you’re at a drive-in fast food place, driving nothing but a pair of Rockports.

It can make you feel rather small. But that feeling, the shrinking feeling when you know everyone is gawking at you, doesn’t matter much when you’re there to buy your last meal.

Nothing much mattered then. It didn’t matter that I didn’t drive. Too many medications made my brain feel like soup. The anomaly of being a pedestrian at the drive-in was lost on me as I pressed the button and ordered my greasy last meal before I sent myself to the gallows. Eating Paleo, or some other such healthy meal, when I planned to leave the world just an hour or so after would have struck me as pointless. I hadn't even closed and locked the door when I left my house that ugly summer day. Why bother? What did it matter? I wouldn’t be back.

It was quite a shock when the fog was so suddenly cleared. When you sleepwalk through every day, it’s jarring when something jolts you awake. A bright beacon of orange made its way through the haze, and there she was – Allison (so we'll call her for privacy's sake), the pale, skinny ginger girl with whom I’d have graduated a class above or below me, just a few years ago.

I was so alerted from my zombie-like trance that I even had the awareness to wonder what Allison of all people was doing back in our tiny town, working as a carhop at Sonic no less. Basic small town stereotyping, and the traditions in which those stereotypes are based, tells you someone who had been as popular and accomplished in high school as Allison didn't come back to town to work at Sonic. I was sure Allison had left town to go to college, as did everybody who had such a chance. In those days, we weren't as disillusioned with the debt-ridden idea of college as we are now. Something important must have brought her back. Maybe she blew her parents’ money. Maybe she couldn’t handle it. Maybe someone in the family got sick. Maybe it wasn't something as mundane as a summer job or just a realization that college wasn't for her. In any case, the Sonic Drive-In certainly wasn't where one who knew the protocol and promise of small-town youth would have pictured Allison.

There's nothing shameful about working as a fast food carhop. It's hard work. Like any job, a carhop puts up with any number of problems and frustrations. The Iraq War, for instance. If you're old enough to remember, in 2003 the United States and a coalition of other nations went to war with Saddam Hussein's Iraq; France, however, refused to join the effort, much to the ire of some Americans, who expressed their disdain for the French by calling french fries "Freedom Fries." I am not making this up. People were rolling up to Sonic and, with a straight face, ordering "Freedom fries." And of course, the carhops and cooks who repeated the orders were expected to use the absurdly jingoistic term, or risk a lecture on patriotism by the customers. 

But that's another story, I guess. Anyway, whatever brought Allison to work at the Sonic Drive-In that ugly summer of 2007, hardship or nothing special at all, it must have slipped her mind. There wasn’t a trace of embarrassment in her big green eyes – only shock. The same was written on my face. I could feel it (I could feel something!). It was probably the first time my expression had changed in weeks.

Allison was shocked to see me, and I her, but somehow I knew it wasn’t the surprise of seeing an old schoolmate after so long. It wasn't my disheveled appearance, sweaty and clad in a wrinkled plaid shirt. Somehow, I knew that she knew. And somehow, she knew that I knew what had made her eyes grow so wide.

It was some kind of telepathy. No one can tell me any different. We didn’t say a word to each other for the longest, quietest moment. As far as I remembered, our paths had never crossed much in school. It wasn’t a reunion of pals. This silence was different. She knew. I can’t be convinced otherwise.

Allison began to stammer something. It wasn’t about my order, my final order on Earth – she wasn’t looking at the brown bag on the red tray she held. Her big green eyes were still on my muddy brown ones.

“I'm sorry you’re hurting,” I felt her say.

I felt her say it. Or, I felt her think it. It was telepathy, some kind of holy intervention in the form of a para-psychological phenomenon.

“I can’t do it anymore,” I replied. That must have been how my mind answered. Or my heart. I don’t know how much the heart is involved in telepathy.

When Allison finally spoke, with her mouth and vocal cords, it was nothing profound or moving. She repeated my order and delicately handed me my last meal.

She knew. She knew what morbid milestone she held in her hand.

I said, with actual words, “thank you.”

We stood there for another long moment. If anyone had seen us – and come to think of it, I don't remember there being a single car parked at the drive-in at that moment, as if they'd all just faded into the ether as soon as I placed my order – they’d have thought we were both dumbstruck by some unseen, unspoken revelation. As if one of us had just told the other something shocking. And, I suppose, that was indeed the case.

I know that was the case.

I couldn’t take all that beauty anymore. If I was going to do what I’d promised myself to do, I had to leave right then. All that wordless beauty, as sappy as it sounds, was breaking through to me. I couldn’t have that.

I backed away, as if the burger and fries that had just changed hands had been a hostage exchange.

Fifteen or so minutes later, I found myself in a swing in the park, eating my greasy burger and fries. I don’t remember the walk getting there. Despite still being in a daze, I had my wits about me just enough to realize I was the only person in the park. There were no dog walkers, no Frisbee players, no parents and squeaking children. Maybe everyone else had looked out of their windows and seen how ugly, how heavy a summer day could be, and had the sense to stay home.

Stuffing my fries in my mouth, made all the more salty by my tears, I felt the gentle sting of Allison’s telepathy from Sonic again. “Don’t do it. Please, don’t do it.”

I spat the tear-soaked food from my mouth and had a good sob – an actual heaving sob, not just streams of tears. When I caught my breath, I replied to Allison’s mental communique, too exhausted to argue with such mind-power. I used real words.

“Alright,” I managed to croak. “Okay. Okay, I won’t do it.”

I took a drink from my Coke and winced from the acid like it was a long swig of whiskey.

All that maudlin beauty was enough torture to convince me to do, or not to do, anything.

“Just lay off with all this sap before it makes me sick,” I thought. 

I hoped Allison didn’t pick up that last bit of my groaning, grouchy inner monologue. It seemed like such a nasty thing to say to someone who’s just saved your life with the power of telepathy. 

The Semantics of Suicide

For some, it's become inappropriate to use the term "commit suicide." The reasoning behind this is that the word "commit" implies a crime or a moral wrong - i.e. committing adultery, committing murder. Of course, emotional and psychiatric duress should never be classified as something morally reprehensible. So, alternate terms are suggested: "died by suicide," or the somewhat and confusing morbid "completed suicide."

Being a career mental patient, under consistent psychiatric care since I was 14 (I'm now 35), and having attempted to take my own life at least once in the past, I feel I have an authority to speak on the subject, and the right to give advice to anyone else who's struggled with such things:

If you ever confide in someone about your personal experience, and they correct or rebuke you for using the term "commit suicide," should you choose to phrase it that way, you have every right to tell that person to bugger off. To go fly a kite, to suck an egg, to die mad about it. Anyway you choose to phrase it: this is your story, your experience, your struggle. You are under no obligation to adhere to the vocabulary of anyone's else's ideology. 

There's enough anxiety in life as it is, for both mentally healthy and unhealthy people, without adding to it by walking on eggshells to placate others. Don't go out of your way to offend people - but if mental health matters, as we say every May, be good to yourself and don't allow others to burden you with more tension than what's already necessary in daily life.

Sincerely,

a chronic mental patient

Poem: "True Crime"

"He was a slob. Did you ever see him eat? Starving children could fill their bellies with the food that ended up on his beard and his clothes. Dogs would gather to watch him eat. I've never understood gluttony. But I hate it. I hated that about you. He enjoyed disgusting people - being disgusting, the thrill of offending people and making them uncomfortable. He was despicable. He will not be missed."

-The Razor's Edge (1985)

Truth be told, you were despicable, Uncle Jack

Yet you cannot be replaced

You'll never come home, you'll never come back

The earth will soon forget

the shadows in your face.

I'll not pretend you were cavalier

I'll not pretend you were great

Your life was riddled with chances blown,

you left disgust in your wake

But your life was not your own,

it was not yours to take.

I wish I'd been there with you

in the empty Hotel Barringer

I could have listened to your sordid blues

and convinced you to drop your derringer

You were Jack the Terrible

You were no doubt insane

But you cannot be replaced

Your life was precious all the same.

When your friends drifted away,

ran away,

friends, the only thing a broken man has,

You said life was like prison, like Alcatraz

San Quentin, the Green Mile -

you hated to wake each day

To be born, you said, was to break into jail

To be born, you said, was to sail to Guantanamo Bay

But I insist you should have stayed

We were both decked in orange, locked behind bars

True crime is all the rage these days

You and me, alone and loathsome,

we could have been documentary stars. 

Poem: While Thinking of Ashley Mattingly & A Mass Shooting in Nova Scotia

You've taught your children how to walk
And how to help little old ladies who can't
You've taught your children about
the Underground Railroad
and the charge at Iwo Jima
Have you taught them
not to rage when they're called crazy
for believing such crazy bravery?

Have you taught them what crazy looks like?
Have you taught them what to say to crazy people?
and how to listen to their stories?
To keep eye contact? How often to nod?
Have you taught them how to talk to the cops
when they go crazy, too?

Have you taught them about Dred Scott?
About Waco and Oklahoma City?
About Casey Anthony and Adolf Hitler?
Have you taught them how to howl
at the tops of their lungs?
Have you taught them ah who cares?
"hAvE yOu TaUgHt YoUr ChIlDrEn?"
Nobody cares

The Privilege of Sorrow: A Conversation With God About Suicide

Recently I wrote to someone, "hold onto your sorrows. Treasure them. Not the debilitating stuff, the depression, but the grief that moves you to help someone, to change something, to keep something, to relate to a friend you cherish or even a stranger you despise. Grief is good."
The Bible agrees: "Sorrow is better than laughter, for by a sad countenance the heart is made better" (Ecclesiastes 7:3).

Good advice as it may have been, it was obscenely hypocritical to come from me that one's sorrows must be used for good - for much of this year (2018) I've consciously and desperately wanted to die.

Blanket statements about mental health issues are a great hindrance to proper mental health education. One of those blanket statements is "suicide is selfish." However, I've seen this combated by another blanket statement: "suicide is not selfish - the person just wants the pain to end." What people making these ignorant statements don't realize is that both can be true: in my case, my desire for death stems from not only grief, but also from self-pity, vanity, and cowardice. I don't speak for anyone else's desire for death, but in my case, my desire to die is partly selfish. The lesson here being, for all you keyboard counselors who think a shared social media post is proper mental health education, it's counterproductive to try and fight one ignorant generalization with another.

Job wails in the book bearing his name, "My days have passed, my plans are shattered. Yet the desires of my heart turn night into day; in the face of the darkness light is near. If the only home I hope for is the grave, if I spread out my bed in the realm of darkness, if I say to corruption, 'You are my father,' and to the worm, 'My mother' or 'My sister,' where then is my hope - who can see any hope for me? Will it go down to the gates of death? Will we descend together into the dust?" 

And so my heart has felt for much of the past ten months.

Today I found out a friend of mine is slowly killing herself with drugs. It saddened me to dizziness. Sorrow that literally makes you dizzy, hurts you physically, is a strangely noble feeling; you feel like you're doing right simply by being sad, simply by the fact that you feel enough for another living person that their pain gives you pain (maybe a bit self-righteous, but still slightly noble).
I prayed to God that He would save her life. "Please don't let her die," I prayed. Sometimes, though we wait for and yearn for Him to speak to us, it can be a frightening blow to one's ego and self-assuredness when God answers us.

The Holy Spirit replied (not audibly, but you know what I mean), "From where did you gather the gall to ask Me to lead someone to life? Do you not pray to Me to take you away? To let you fade away and die? To be shot down by some mass shooter's bullet so your friends will hate themselves for 'forgetting you?'"

"I know," I replied sheepishly (not audibly, but you know what I mean), "but I want her to live. Just because I don't want to live doesn't mean she shouldn't want to live."

"For what? One of the things about which you cry to Me is the hideousness of the world: the idolatry, the violence, the depravity, the apathy. All of these things you to mention to Me when you ask Me to take you out of it. Why, then, do you want her to stay and suffer through it while you're taken to Abraham's Bosom?"

There's no sense in lying to God or using lawyer language to evade His questions. So I had to be honest and answer, "because I'm selfish. Because I'm a coward. I don't have the strength to fight anymore. I don't have the strength to do this. I can't beat it. I can't beat the awful things I think and do."

"I've beaten them for you. You tell others about it all the time, about the cross at Golgotha. You've no ignorance of My blood spilled, My body broken for you. You know that you were buried with Me in death and raised with Me in resurrection. I told you beforehand: 'In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer - I have overcome the world.'"

"I'm too far gone, Lord. I'm of no use anymore. I've rendered myself useless."

"Who are you to tell Me what use you are? Was it not I who formed you, who fashioned your days, who numbered them when there were none? Am I not the One who has given you a purpose? Did I put you here by accident? Did I put you here to die? Is this your great commission - to pray for death?"

"No, Lord. 'When there was no ear to hear, You sang to me.'"

"Remember, I told you: 'Most assuredly, I say to you that you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice; and you will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will be turned into joy. A woman, when she is in labor, has sorrow because her hour has come; but as soon as she has given birth to the child, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a human being has been born into the world. Therefore you now have sorrow; but I will see you again and your heart will rejoice, and your joy no one will take from you.'"

Chris Cook - "Wrestling God"

I had no response. My argument was crushed. God continued,

"You wrote to others to use their sorrow for good. You say well. But beware of hypocrisy; I do not desire hypocrisy for you - you cannot tell these things to others while you yourself crawl under the earth. You cannot encourage others in the abundant life I give while you yourself wallow in death and misery. You cannot tell others how I save while you yourself long for the crematorium."

I felt a peace wash over me as God continued - again, not audibly, but you know what I mean,

"Choose life and you will have the right to pray that your friend will do the same. You were grateful to feel sorrow for her. To feel sorrow for her means you have love for her. There are many wicked people who feel nothing for those like her. Be glad you have a heart so heavy. The devil comes only to steal, kill and destroy. I have come that you may have life, and have it more abundantly."

And so it was that I learned it's a privilege to feel sorrow. It's a privilege to be alive and to hurt for others in pain. That's what those feelings that break our hearts are - they're life. Without them we'd be catatonic creatures, an argument in favor of the lie that we're an accidental cosmic sneeze that became slime that became walking corpses in suits.

I thank God I'm alive. And I thank God for my sorrow.

When the Nobodies Die

I've been in psychiatric treatment for eighteen years this August - over half my life. I've been hospitalized in mental health facilities over a dozen times; on January 8, 2006 I attempted suicide and failed; four of the six medications I'm prescribed are psychiatric drugs; I feel I'm qualified to talk about mental illness.

I wish that the world would mourn so strongly when anyone, not just a celebrity, no matter how beloved, dies in the throes of depression. We're all beloved in God's eyes. Even if TMZ and CNN don't know our names, He does. I wish we mourned as openly and as deeply for Mary in Jonesboro, for Henry in Marseilles, for Nora in Manila - not only if they took their own lives in despair, but if they live with tears and hunger. Why shouldn't I also Tweet and wear a black armband for an "unknown" O.D. victim? Why should we reserve our loudest calls for mental health funding for when a beloved and well-known figure takes their life?

How many lives could be saved if we stopped reserving our tears for only the most stunning tragedies, and gave them to everyone with a broken heart? And how many more would be encouraged if we just as openly celebrated the return of their hope, once lost in darkness?

"Rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep." -Romans 12:15

Christians & Suicide

It's almost impossible to make the claim that suicide will not send a Christian to hell without
appearing as though you're advocating the taking of one's life. I've seen many people make the argument that suicide is not an unforgivable sin, only to be accused of heresy or abandon for the sanctity of life. But I don't write this to make suicide look harmless or pure. It's not. God does not wish for anyone to take their own life - if a person does so, they are trying to usurp the authority of God. Suicide may seem like a way of relief to we who are in despair, but it only punishes those we leave behind - it leaves them with guilt, questions, and agony. We have no right to do so to those we love.

Having said that, it's not my wish to defend suicide, but only to refute a teaching that is not Biblically based, despite being taught and believed by many Christians. We all have a duty to rebuke false teachings, no matter how well-intended they may be. In this case, it's the teaching that suicide is an unforgivable sin, even for a saved person; that suicide is a one-way ticket to hell, despite Jesus' death and resurrection. Again, I write these things not to defend or encourage suicide, but only as a way to, firstly, refute an incorrect notion concerning the Bible, and to perhaps assure those with saved loved ones who have taken their own lives that their sin - and suicide is indeed a sin - did not negate Jesus' covenant.

First, let's look at suicide from a mental and emotional point of view. The human instinct is to survive. If one's brain has seemingly lost that instinct, and instead harbors the opposite and a longing to die, something is wrong. I'm not saying that their obviously impaired mental judgment relieves them wholly of responsibility; I only say this to provide insight to what's going on in their heads. I've attempted suicide once, on January 8, 2006, and I'm glad to say I failed. Further, for the better part of the next year, I planned again to take my own life. But the hand of God delivered me - that terrible year came and went, but I did not go with it. Since then, there have been times when I desired so strongly to die that I've considered ending my own life. But love has preserved me. Praise God! "The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly" (John 10:10).

Now, let's talk about what is truly "the unforgivable sin."

Many Christians develop their notion that suicide is an unforgivable sin based on the suicide of Judas Iscariot. But they're missing the bigger picture beyond Judas' noose. Judas will not inherit the kingdom of God, not because he hanged himself, but because of his betrayal of Jesus Christ into the hands of sinners. Judas not only betrayed our Lord, but was not a godly man before that - John's account mentions that he would regularly steal the money kept by the disciples. (But even so, I find it an example of God's unfathomable grace that, for a time, Judas Iscariot was an apostle - given authority by Jesus to heal the sick and cast out unclean spirits - imagine! The man who would betray our Lord, given the power by the same Lord to do amazing things to proclaim His kingdom!)

The actual "unforgivable sin" cannot be committed today, because those who committed this sin are no longer alive. This sin was the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit spoken by the scribes and Pharisees who rejected Jesus. They attributed His works to Satan. Mark chapter 3 reads: "Assuredly, I say to you, all sins will be forgiven the sons of men, and whatever blasphemies they may utter; but he who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is subject to eternal condemnation” - because they said, “He has an unclean spirit.”" These people - the "wicked and adulterous generation," as Jesus called them - have all since died.

The unforgivable sin today is more of an unforgivable state - the state of unrepentant rejection of Jesus as Lord.

Now let's look at the argument that the suicide of a saved person will revoke their salvation.

"Even a Christian goes to hell if they commit suicide."
Why does this particular sin nullify Christ's work on the cross? Does His death not atone for all sins of those who accept Him?
"But there's obviously no way for them to atone for it afterwards, because they're dead."
So the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross is incomplete? This is what's implied if some additional human chore is needed. Our only responsibility is to accept it or reject it. How can we call Christ's atoning blood complete if a sin still needs some human action to be considered forgiven? 
"The person took their own life! That's wrong!"
It is wrong. But what if a saved person gets into an argument with a loved one and says heated things they didn't mean, then moments later, suffers a heart attack? Or if two unmarried people fornicate, and on the way home they're killed in a fatal car crash? Because they didn't have time or chance to 'atone' for that sin by some special prayer, confession, or deed before they happened to die moments later, does that prevent them from entering into eternity with Jesus?
"Those sins are not as bad as suicide."
There are sins that are more severe than others. But all of them boil down to disobedience to God. Romans 6:1 tells us that, just because we're saved and under grace, doesn't mean we should go about sinning, shrugging it off with 'I'm already saved.' That's not living under grace - that's attempting to trample it. But even so, no mistake made by a saved person is bigger than the body and blood of Christ. To say so is to say the sacrifice of God is not sufficient without human works. If this is the case, we should begin stocking up on animals for sacrifices to atone for our sins, because the blood of Christ is somehow negated by certain wrongs.

There is no Scriptural evidence to support the claim that the sin of suicide negates the cross for a saved person.

The person who takes his or her own life will give an account on the Day of Judgment, as we all will, and the sin that ended their mortal life will surely be among the things they must answer for. The premature ending of their own life will leave many chances to minister to others undone, and unclaimed rewards in heaven. But it does not hinder one of Christ's sheep from entering into His eternal pasture which He has promised to those who believe His word - even if their minds and hearts were so tormented or broken they felt they could not wait for their Shepherd's comforting staff.

Suicide is a sin against God. But it is also, in most cases, a sign of something terribly wrong with the mind - a broken heart can drive the mind to fragility, and vice versa. If someone you know has contemplated or attempted suicide, or even alluded to not wanting to live anymore, minister to them as much as you're able, and encourage them to seek professional help. We must also remind them there is no hopelessness in Christ. He can lead us through the most pitch black of darkness, the most grueling and agonizing of sorrows, the most devastating of losses and loneliness.

The Bible never promises a rainbow-riddled fairy tale world for believers. In fact, the Bible promises pain and hardship. But we're also promised abundant life, both on earth and in eternity. Giving up in pain and idly waiting for death is not living. To say that death is our release from sin and misery is to say death is our savior, not Jesus. This is one of the many lies in which the devil delights.

Let us not relegate suicide prevention and awareness to copy-and-paste posts on social media. Everyone who ever took their own life, saved or not, had a story. It's our job as Christians, as ambassadors for Christ who died and rose again, to be compassionate and loving, even in the midst of our own heartaches, to take the time to hear another's story, another's despair. While a person in distress still breathes, let our focus not be to drill into their heads the sinfulness of suicide - they know this well. I knew it well, but as with any other temptation, my flesh and my mind warred against me to the point that I allowed myself not to care, at least for the moment. Rather than a lecture on sin, let our focus be to show them the love of Christ who longs for them to continue on with their brothers and sisters through the valley of the shadow of death, shining the light and unkillable hope of His Gospel in a dark and ugly world.

For more information on how to help the mentally ill, please visit nami.org.

My Sinful Desire For Death

"I think it's a sin not to want to live." - Warren Zevon

There was a time in my life (it may be known to you as "2005-2009") when I didn't like being alive. To put it further, I didn't want to live anymore. For the most part, I wasn't doing anything to hasten my death - save for a suicide attempt on January 8, 2006, which as it turned out did no damage whatsoever to my physical well-being.

My desire to die came from a compound of things, namely a psychiatric illness that still backhands me, an illness I can describe best as being like "an anthology of vulgar words on a vandalized memorial." What made it worse was the devil's exploitation of my illness; it's no sin to be ill by any means, and any doctrine that teaches so is un-Biblical and false. Knowing God has things for me to do, epic and awesome things, the devil decided to try and convince me to not do anything at all but wait for death, knowing he could no longer convince me to commit outright suicide.

But though it's no sin to be ill, mentally or physically, my sin lay in the things borne of my desire for death. In 2 Corinthians 5:1-8, the apostle Paul wrote of worldly trials and the subsequent desire to leave this earth and be with God in heaven, and the promise that, though we remain temporarily on this earth, we have a heavenly home with the Lord to which we will go someday.
But my desire to die defied God's holy Scripture in that, though my main want was to be with Him and away from pain, I did not delight in doing His will by living before dying; rather, I was merely existing.
Further, each aspect of my wish for death was rooted in selfishness and vanity. When I'd fantasize about my funeral I'd think of what song they would play; maybe some mid-tempo tune that described me so poignantly. I'd think of people getting up to speak, telling stories of me, and the funny things I did; I'd even relish the thought of Marlon Prichard telling of the time I tricked him into joining the Black Panthers, eliciting laughter for me, and of course, tears for me.

Philippians 3:7-14 tells us of leaving our worldly riches, our worldly wisdoms and self-perceived awesomenesses behind for the sake of following Christ. In my case, my riches in this world were very dark and bitter riches, a wealth of death and tears.

These days, I revel not in a desire to die, but I revel in the struggles on earth, the battles of good and evil, the overcoming of painful, lonely trials with faith and love. It oddly gives me strength, to hear someone tell me that my belief is an unevolved superstition, as the whole time my faith is cursed, I live and feel His strength and truth down to my bone marrow - I liken their mockery to the college kids in the 60s who spat on Vietnam War veterans; they were haughty in their own perceived righteousness, and held disdain for those who had been to war, all the while safe with their Dylan records and smoky dorms.
I'm living now, and painful as living can be, I'm alive; God delivered me, and led me away from the cushy, Nerf-soft comfort of hopelessness and death.