by Dymphna Morrissey

Created on: August 03, 2011   Last Updated: August 07, 2011

He had once noted that his first fear was the fear of choking.  He had refused food because of this fear.  He had also been the giver and the receiver of silent treatments that had paradoxically brought on the reality he hoped to avoid.  It seemed that in every miscommunication he had felt “suffocated”, strangled”, simply “hanging”.

Though in life, he wished he were invisible, it was at the moment of his death he hoped he could multiply versions of himself for everyone.  He fantasized about committing suicide and being ubiquitously placed at the site of every person he hated.  What had set off this thinking?  He never could figure it out until that last moment of clarity showed him its irrelevancy.

He had never told anybody because whenever he spoke, they misunderstood him.  All he could say was that they did not grasp the profundity of his desire and because they couldn’t or wouldn’t, he felt strangled, enclosed in secrecy, and despairing of assistance, though after thinking the matter over, pretty sure it was not possible in the way that he desired.

He was not a smart guy, but he was not a stupid guy.  He could be funny sometimes, but equally morose.  He could talk while feeling empty, but it was at the times when he had a lot to say, that he felt the most pressure to say as little as possible.  He seemed to be in a tight net at the bottom of the sea where when he stuck his tongue out a hole it was then bitten off by a shark.

There was the onslaught of mockery that was due to his failed vigilance, which often resulted in small outbursts that were seen as an imposition on the peace of mind of otherwise healthy people.  These people immediately accused him of being selfish.  From then on, he stopped sharing his real feelings and ideas about life.  And nobody really noticed because they were no longer hindered or disturbed by his previous outbursts.

He had an ex-girlfriend who taunted him by giving him the silent treatment, old friends who called him a loser, siblings he hadn’t seen in years, and a blotchy employment history.  Bosses called him a discipline problem and past acquaintances could only say the vaguest things about him. 

He had grown up in a normal environment, which was mundane, boring, and filled with useless statements that defied questioning due to the ambivalence that the speakers betrayed.  The first one he remembered

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