In the past two weeks I have attended two different survivors of suicide group. My motivation for going has been an increasing level of frustration and outright anger about little things, particularly when I am at home alone. In part I think my anger is about the unrelenting nature of grief. Almost every other experience you live through is either time limited, or feels good even if it lasts and lasts. Grief has neither of those attributes. Every time I turn around it is there, waiting for me; implacable, unreasoning, seemingly unending.
Expressing myself to close friends has gotten me a long ways, and I will certainly continue to avail myself of their love and compassion. Relationships are like an alloy metal, forged in the heat of shared emotion, containing elements of both participants. The relationships I am continuing to forge with my closets friends has only been made stronger by this new round of tempering.
But talking to people without a common experience can only carry me so far. In the end I am trying to express an agony for which there is no language except common experience. Therefore I have sought out these two survivors of suicide groups. Attending group is a new experience in and of itself, so I am aware that my first impressions are more about the oddness of exposing myself to strangers than anything else. I am planning on continuing to attend for at least three months before deciding whether or not to continue.
My first impressions are several and varied. I’ve met a total of 8 individuals or couples that have all had someone complete suicide. Two have lost brothers, the rest children. I am the only one who has lost his or her spouse. And, without more details about individual circumstances, it appears that Michele was the only person choosing suicide instead of a protracted illness. I feel set apart from the group due to these two facts. Both groups have an underlying agenda regarding suicide prevention and education, and I recognize that the loss of teenage or young adult children is the root of this movement. I feel it is appropriate and worthy to pursue, but I know it isn’t what I am looking for.
I am looking for a place to express all my thoughts, my emotions, my fears. I am looking for a place where I can’t manipulate the situation to shelter me from the darker places my emotions want to carry me. I need someone who won’t be cowed by my tenacity or will to dominate the interaction. What I need, I think, is a skilled bereavement counselor. I feel the group will be useful for me, but too easy to manipulate to really provide any true growth opportunities. I guess I need to seek out a professional counselor.
Today is the anniversary of the day I asked Michele to marry me. That she said yes filled me with joy and happiness. I was proud to be her husband and honored to be her friend. Today I have mixed feelings, but mostly I am having good memories. I’ve written more about it on her site, andifyoudidknow.com.
I spent the last week or so listening to Blink! The Power of Thinking Without Thinking in the car, and thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it. An exploration into our intuitive selves, Blink! examines our ability to “thin slice” information and to make amazingly accurate inferences from tiny bits of information. This book will alter the way you look at your thoughts.
Rating: Buy it and listen to it. Twice.
After letting my intention to have a page of my movies, books, and other media diversions languish for a year, I have finally gotten my act together and configured it the way I want. Now I can make entries that will appear on the main page that will also be picked up by the diversions page. The old system required a double entry and therefore never happened.
Despite a cyber-ish sounding name, Firewall isn’t really about computers or hackers or even firewalls. It’s really about a man trying to protect his family from bad guys. All in all not a bad movie, just not a great one either.
Rating: Wait for the DVD release
An altogether excellent film about the indomitable spirit of Burt Munro and his quest to prove his largely hand-built Indian motorcycle was the fastest in the world. Along the way he meets and charms a number of ordinary people. Anthony Hopkins is perfect as Burt Munro, and The World’s Fastest Indian is a perfect Sunday afternoon movie.
Rating: Go see it in the theater
A good friend introduced me to Evanescence today. It’s the combination of a classically trained pianist and a heavy metal band producing something called “gothic rock.” One listen and I was hooked. Their debut album, Fallen is available on Amazon.
Rating: Play it loud
I originally posted about this album a while back, specifically her rendition of From A Distance which still soothes the ache in my heart when I hear it.
Now I want to say that the entire album is outstanding. I never would have believed that I would enjoy a country (admittedly cosmopolitan country) so much, but I do. You will too. Get it via the iTunes Music Store link below.
Rating: Infectiously good
Wow.
One new category and it generates four postings in one day. And two postings about the category itself. A banner day here at Zanshin World Domination Headquarters.
Expect a mild posting surge as I catch up on all the diversions I’ve wanted to share recently. Posting at its regular sporadic pace will resume shortly.
Update: Make that five postings in one day, plus two meta postings.
A long time ago, when I was a budding programming student, one of my professors had us keep a log of our abends (abnormal ends) and our corrective action. The idea was to learn our bad programming habits and eliminate them from our code. He periodically collected the notebooks and reviewed our log. Repeated errors of the same type were questioned. All in all it was an interesting learning tool.
For the past couple of months I have been watching American Choppers on The Discovery Channel. Each episode, between the bickering Pauls, they manage to build another jewel of a motorcycle. The process seems to follow these steps: minimal visible design, lots of fabrication and careful fitting of parts and components, paint/powder coat/chrome, and then final assembly. And every single episode when final assembly rolls around not all the parts go together correctly. It seems that the thickness of powder coat, or chrome, or paint, mucks with their tight tolerances. Every. Single. Time.
As a student of the process I follow to construct applications I am very aware of repeated steps. Especially those that cause the same problem over and over again. Now I realize that the boyz at Orange County Chopper don’t have control over the powder coat/paint/chrome process, but you’d think that after a couple of dozens time they’d be better at anticipating the delays and issues caused by the need to clean out fittings or scrape off excess finish.
I’m just saying.