A Pair of Shoes

I stopped by the Art Gallery on my way to lunch today. Not to visit any exhibit inside, or to catch some of the second-hand BC Bud wafting from the bike couriers that like to hang out there between gigs. I stopped by to drop off a pair of shoes.

Am I Paranoid?

One of the issues surrounding my sister’s death a year ago was the litany medication that she had been taking. It was already known that there is a dubious relationship between psychiatry and the big drug companies, making me think that perhaps these drugs were unnecessary. A little reading, though, indicates that perhaps the problem is bigger than originally thought.

Nothing Better to Do

I sat down this morning for an interview, the first one I have had in a long time. I was actually quite nervous.

The Stigma of Kurt Cobain

There is no denying that there is a stigma around suicide. Until someone close to me passed away, it very rarely came up in conversation. It’s not like I talk about it to everyone, but when I to open up that wound, almost everyone has similar experiences. What is interesting to me is that this stigma about suicide can manifest itself in a wide range of interesting ways. Because of this, even those that are the staunchest advocates for removing this stigma can sometimes get caught up in the very thing they are trying to remove. Here’s a peek.

Been Down that Rabbit Hole

All the way through high school, the learning was easy for me. Homework was a breeze for me, I did nerdy stuff like extra math and physics work, and joined the chess club.

Adolescence of a Book

As I might have alluded to in the past here (and certainly have talked about openly with friends and family), I have a book in me that is working it’s way out.

Billy Walker

Note: This post is a bit longer, and perhaps a bit more serious than the usual fare here (if there can be a usual fare after only a month). I’m heading down a path with this post that hopefully coalesce into a story with a real point or two sometime down the road…

One of my earliest friendships was with Billy Walker. He lived across the street from us, two doors down from Mrs. Mears’ store, along a highway that was far less populated than it is now, and far less travelled.

One Life, One Chance

I grabbed an opportunity to run through some e-mails ‘n stuff in a Starbuck’s this morning, and someone ahead of me had “One Life, One Chance” tattooed across her back. Not too impressed with the artwork, apparently based on a song by H20, but the message resonated with me.

Fragmentation

One of the things I’m doing these days is a little support for a group called the Josh Platzer Society. Josh was a teenager when he decided to take his own life in 1999, and his mother Jude started the society to raise teenage awareness of this thing that, as I noted before, has touched far more of us than we might suspect.

Oh, and That Death Thing

People deal with the loss of a loved one in many ways, but I have learned that one of the most common ways, no matter how close the bond was, is to not talk about it.