Without a Ripple

He’s dead, and they don’t even notice.

I just searched the sites of the local paper, and all three local stations. Three, people, this isn’t New York City. I searched his name, the name of the motel, the street the motel is on, suicide, and drug overdose. Nothing.

What gives them the right to decide he’s not worth even one line in their damn paper? Unless I pay ten cents a character, of course.

I don’t know why I’m surprised. Money is the only way to tell someone’s worth, after all. I mean, if it had been dramatic, so he could help them SELL papers, that would be different. But it wasn’t. He just slipped quietly away, without a ripple.

I’m going to make some damn ripples. The world is going to know the wonderful man who was my husband. I’m starting here, but I’ll go on. You’ll see. I will be published, I will be famous, and his obituary will be read by far more people than this stupid little one-paper-but-pretend-it’s-two could ever hope to reach.

Depression is NOT a social disease! Even those have begun to lose their stigma, thank God.

People, it’s time to make a decision. Will you slap a label on someone, and go on your merry way? It’s not your problem, he chose to be an alcoholic/junkie/codependent/nut case/street bum/prostitute/slut/crackhead/loon? Or are you going to admit to yourself that you are looking at a fellow human being, and that there, but for the grace of God, goes you?

Scary, isn’t it? What would you be like, if your mother handed you off to your grandparents at three, and Grandpa spent the next year getting his jollies up your ass? If your mom handed you a joint at seven? If you and your sister were abused by boyfriend after boyfriend, while mom tried every drug that came down the pike?

Go ahead. Tell me you’d have been a better man than he.

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