Forever responsible for what you have tamed?

Digression from: The seventh

I’ve seen many times people saying that no one cares for them, that no one would give a damn if they killed themselves and other things along these lines. It’s terrible being alone in the world, and I do feel sorry for their situation. However, I can’t stop thinking that if no one cared about me it would be easier for me to take some radical decisions. More specifically, if my mother didn’t care about me it would be very easy for me to kill myself.

My mother was always a very kind, caring and honest person who did everything she could to help people around her. Imagine the kind of person who would take a wounded pigeon from the street and take care of it at home to free it after its recovery. Well, that’s the sort of thing she does or is often tempted to do. And even though she’s somewhat naïve and very fragile at heart, all the many losses, deceptions and hardships she endured on her life gave her a tremendous resilience and made of her the person who all her family relies upon in times of need. When I think of her, the first images that come to my mind is of her working, and that’s pretty much what she did her entire life besides taking care of others: work every single day to provide for me and her parents. Still today, on her way to her eighties, she works. Not nearly as frenetically as before, but still works. Her parents already died, I take care of myself and I pay many of her expenses, but she can’t stop working, it became part of her, and it’s good for her to keep her mind busy because I think deep down she still suffers with all the deceptions she had in life.

On the opposite side of the spectrum, there is my father. He was an irascible thick stupid ignorant superstitious moron his entire existence. He thought he was always right and things had always to be done his way, which usually was the stupid way. He would get irritated pretty easily and would listen to no one, even when talking to people who were more knowledgeable than him on the matter — it was not hard to be more knowledgeable than him on any matter, to tell the truth — Alright, I am not being fair, there were some he would listen to, like mediums, numerologists, pastors etc; depending on which belief he had at the moment, as he changed it from time to time. It’s hard to find something good about him… Well, he was undeniably a hard worker, that’s all I could say. Oh, and he was my role model of what I should strive not to be, especially as a father, although I didn’t become one. I’m glad our genes are the only thing we have in common.

I am convinced that my father was the worst accident in my mother’s life, and they were so incompatible that it’s hard to fathom how they ended up married. My mother says he was very quiet when they met and that she liked it. She says she only started to realize how despicably rude he was after the marriage. So in the end he was a handsome guy who didn’t talk much, and by keeping his stupidity to himself for a while he managed to take my mother to the altar — be mindful of people who keep too much to themselves, you never know if what they are hiding is an angel or a demon.

I remember my parents would fight all the time and I remember of three episodes when he beat her in the face. I know there are other assholes out there who are much more violent and do much worse things to their wives, but it doesn’t change that he was a stupid asshole too. He would spank me with a belt even for small things, and even though my mother beat me sometimes too, his reactions were always totally out of proportion. Needless to say, I hated that idiot, and since I didn’t have any siblings, I had to deal with the fucker alone. I was relieved when my mother finally got a divorce, when I was about 12 years old. It meant I would have to work more to help her, but it was good nevertheless. And even though I never actively avoided him, I saw him only a few times after that. Today he is a total stranger to me and I’m glad he stopped being part of my life. Actually, I was never able to see him as a father and I feel mostly indifferent about him today, I can’t even say that I hate him anymore, as I quickly forgot about him. I just feel sorry for not having had someone else as a father, this is what makes me sad sometimes. If one day I receive the notice of his death, I will probably just acknowledge that society got slightly better and that’s all.

So I never think of my father when I am in trouble or when I think about suicide. I don’t think he dislikes me, actually I think he probably misses me somehow, but he had his chance. However, I always think about my mother when in trouble, and especially when I think about suicide. I don’t think about her wishing she could help me, what happens is that I remember that I am too important to her to let things go wrong; If she knew about my suffering, she would suffer as much as me, and there is also the fact that without my help she would be in a very difficult situation financially speaking.

So I wonder… what if my mother had been someone who didn’t care much about me? What if she was a bad person like my father? I certainly wouldn’t care much about her either, and I probably wouldn’t have left college to work for more time and help her when she started to need help. The never-ending cycle of starting and stopping college would not have begun. Or even if my life had been exactly the same up until now, I wouldn’t need to worry about the suffering I would cause her by killing myself.

But she has always been a great person, she always cared for me, she always did everything she could for me. And even though I know I should be grateful for this, I always felt like this was an immense burden: I couldn’t let her down, I couldn’t make or let her suffer; I can’t allow her to suffer more than what she already did in her life! So since I left home I never ever allowed her to find out about any bad thing that happened to me. Many times I lied, many times I faked it, many times I told her everything was OK when my world was crumbling down, and this is how I’ve always been an image of a safe harbor to her.

I truly wish she didn’t care about me. I am just faking anyway, I am just pretending I am a good son. I like her, but she has always been very different from me, just like the rest of my relatives. I never have much to talk to her. I always pretend to be interested on what she has to say because I don’t want her to feel bad. I never miss her, even when we don’t see each other for the whole year. The only thing that matters to me is knowing that she is OK, that she feels happy, and I am well aware that I am very important for her happiness. The thing is that I feel sorry for the life she had, and I know I am her only achievement.

I managed to create a situation in which even if I die by suicide, she will receive enough money to have a tranquil life. It gives me some peace of mind, but it’s not enough. I know she would die inside with my death…

So, yes, I wish people didn’t care about me. I would feel more free to kill myself.

But do you know what it means to truly feel free to end your life? It’s not desperation, not sadness, not feeling it is the only way out — if you feel suicide is “the only way”, it means you feel obliged to do it, not that you feel free to do it — freedom is what it means, freedom to do anything your body allows you to.

Suicide is a radical decision, one from which you cannot turn back, so if you have managed to find courage to take such a radical decision, it also means you have found the courage — and the freedom — to make other radical changes in your life.

The radical change my life needs now is one that will allow me to finally let go of everything and everyone, including, or perhaps especially, those who care about me.