Mowing...

I just came in from mowing the grass...  I didn't get it all mowed because it got dark, but I mowed until the the sun was down.  Every time I mow the grass when the sun starts setting I think of a man I once knew.  He was my neighbor... he lived across the street.  When I was going to Clemson, Steve (my boyfriend) and I lived out in the country in little cinder block house for a year.  The man, whose name I can't remember, lived across the road in a trailer with his wife and 2 little boys.  I remember the boys especially (they were about 4 and 6), because they used to wander over to my house all the time to see my birds.  I spoke to the man a few times, and he was always very friendly...  His wife, however, always looked irritated and would not say a word.

One night as the sun was almost down, the man got on his mower, and started cutting his grass.  It was late spring or early summer, and it was very late.  I was working out in the living room, and I remember wondering why in the world he would start mowing the grass so late.  I remember his grass was very high...  He mowed and mowed well into the night.  I thought it was so strange.  I don't know why I thought it was so so strange, I mean after all, it was none of my business...  But I sat there and watched him, thinking how weird it was.

The next day I was home alone...  I'm not sure where Steve was.  I don't remember that part.  In the afternoon I noticed an old man banging on the door across the street and trying to look through the windows.  Then he came over to my house and asked if he could use my phone.  That was not unusual at all, because none of our immediate neighbors had phones.  So I let him, he called someone, and when he got off the phone he asked me if I had heard anything that morning.  I said that no I hadn't.  Soon, the landlord of the trailer (who was also my landlord) came over and opened the door.  Shortly the police  and ambulance came....  It gets fuzzy after that.  I remember being asked again if I had heard any shots... No.  Turns out the man's wife had left him a few weeks before and had taken the children (I hadn't even noticed they were gone), and he had become so distraught that he blew his head off with a shotgun that morning ( I never did hear the shot).  It was shocking because he always seemed like such a happy guy.  All I could think was, if he was going to kill himself, why did he spend so much time the night before mowing his lawn in the dark?  Maybe he wanted to make the place presentable for whoever found him.  I just thought it was strange.  Obviously, it made an impression on me, because every time I  mow as the sun goes down, I think of him.  Poor man. I hope he found his peace...

Wow, that is heavy...  What makes it even heavier is that that man is not the only person that I was acquainted with who committed suicide that year.  Earlier in the year, I think it may have been February, one of my classmates killed herself.  Her name was Julie.  And her story still haunts me to this day.  But, I am making myself depressed now, so I better save her story for another post...