For The Heart Cries

February 26,1994 "Who cares for those on their own? Who cries for those who die alone? Who reaches for those in need? Who listens to those who plead? Who feels for those in pain? Only those who live in vain?                                                                               Thomas Truelson I have read that the worst way to die is to realize that when you died no one would care - and what we most crave most in life is that someone, somewhere, remembers and loves us. On Wednesday, the 23rd, I went to Nickerson Funeral Home here in Chatham and made my funeral arrangements - although I told the director that I was there for a friend who was dying of cancer.  I picked out a casket, chose the type of service I wanted - no wake - and was given all the necessary paperwork, which I'll fill out and put in my safe deposit box. I want my funeral Mass at Holy Redeemer in Chatham and I want to be buried with my grandparents, George and Catherine Frawley, in Randolph. My

February 25, 1994 "Hope in reality is the worst of all evils, because it prolongs the torments of man."                                                                             Friedrich Nietzsche Since my college days I have kept a notebook of interesting quotes - flipping through it last night I came across the above quote from Nietzsche. My guess is that I wrote it down about twenty years ago. The quote is also the silver lining to my perilous predicament. Since I am engulfed in hopelessness, I know that the tortures of the torments I suffer will bot be prolonged. For on the third Sunday in May I rendezvous with relief and redemption - my reward, release from relentless reality. I have noticed lately that my physical condition is deteriorating - it's as if my emotional condition has somehow overpowered, suppressed, any concern for my physical well being.  Physically, I am weakening. I have difficulty sleeping, I wake up at least a half dozen times a nigh

February 24, 1994 "I can't face another day...I wonder if these changes have left a scar on you, like all the burning hoops of fire that you and I passed through... I hope you're happy now'"                   Elton John/Bernie Taupin - Funeral For A Friend/Loves Lies Bleeding Some "B" words: bludgeon, butcher, bombard, banishment, burdens, blasphemy, bleak, betrayal, beg, beseech, blood. I spend far too much time alone with my thoughts, but I have no place to go. With my future holding no promise and the present devoid of meaning, it is the past that I cling to. There are days, even weeks, when my mind and whole being feel handcuffed to the past - the shackles so secure, escape is impossible. I remember when I first met Maggie, June 8, 1980, it was a beautiful Sunday in Boston. We had brunch at J. C. Hillary's on Boylston Street and later that afternoon we drove to Kimball's in Westford for ice cream. Before the month of June was over,

February 23, 1994 " What good is anything if at the end you come to your death with no one to hold your hand."                                                                           Joyce Rebeta-Burditt - The Cracker Factory For a long time now, my mind has felt like a Maytag washer stuck on the spin cycle, around and around it goes. At times beyond my control, as if a mind as a mind of its own - with no shut-off switch. Am mentally fatigued, worn-out, exhausted - never realized that thoughts could be so tiresome, thinking so troublesome. Yet, with all the turmoil, I've been able to somehow find the mental freedom to focus on this journal. Although freedom is fleeting, it is a welcome reprieve, for this journal has given meaning to what little life remains within me. Words are my blood. My mind works in mysterious ways. In ten days I have to leave my home and leave everything I hold dear. I have little money, many bills and no real place to live. Yet, what do

February 22, 1994 "Forgotten is forgiven."   F. Scott Fitzgerald With me, nothing is completely forgotten or entirely forgiven. Although it has been my heart's nature to forgive and forget, my mind has never been as merciful. It is not the deeds of others that I have difficulty forgiving and forgetting, bu my deeds - mine alone. When I was born I was wrapped in a blanket of guilt and regret and all these years later it still covers me - a shroud of mental entanglements. I was born with a mutant mind that found reality harsh and cold - pleasure always fleeting, depression always lingering.  Thus I have sought safety in life's illusions of daydreams and fantasies. Every cause may have an effect, but with me every cause has a dozen effects and ramifications - that bury themselves into the crevices of my mind, where they remain to always remind me of past misdeeds. Regrets!!! Although I do not regret being born, I regret being alive. On this warm, clear Tuesd

February 21, 1994 Presidents Day "A house divided against itself cannot stand."                                       Abraham Lincoln Today begins the eleventh week of the War of the Roses, the sequel, a most uncivil war. It has also been, for the most part, a one-sided war. Maggie continually on the offensive as I mentally curl into a fetal position and absorb one verbal blow after another. She has broken my spirit, snapped my will and ignited my insanity. I am a dreamer, a daydreamer, and have always had difficulty dealing with reality. I read once that dreamers can't compete because they don't know how. What I do know is only a coward preys on the weak and Maggie has devoured me - for I have always been a sheep in wolf's clothing. Some thoughts, fantasies and desires should never be shared and should always remain a secret, locked away in the mind's toy box, to be played with only when one is alone. Never, never should they be put down on paper.

February 20, 1994 "Is not man's life on earth a drudgery? I have been assigned months of misery and troubled nights - I am filled with restlessness until dawn. Remember that my life is like the wind, I shall not see happiness again."      Book of Job I am home this Sunday morning, at rest at Harborview.  It's odd how people on the Cape give their homes a name, emboss the name on expensive quarterboard - and the attach it to the front of the house for all to see. Our's is Harborview and as I look across the harbor, the sky and sea are a perfect blue. The Coast Guard Cutter is tied to the main dock and the fishing boats are tied to their moorings. All is quiet and at rest except for the seagulls circling the Fish Pier. This is the last Sunday I'll ever be here at home. Maggie is away this weekend visiting friends - and I am alone with my two best friends, my dog Andy and my cat Yoyo. Never would I have ever believed that two animals could give me such s

   February 19, 1994 "I AM LOVED"       A Button Two days after Anne's death, exactly twenty-five years ago today, I received a letter in the mail. When I opened the envelope, a red button with white lettering fell out and landed on the floor. i picked it up and read the words, "I Am Loved." I remember that my hands were shaking as I pulled the letter from the envelope - believing it was from Anne.  But it wasn't.  It was a letter of sympathy from Mimi and Kay.  Tow classmates that I knew only slightly - well enough to say hello and exchange a few words, but nothing more than that. Quickly everything changed.  Mimi and I became friends, dated,  eventually got married and a few years later divorced. Anne's death, a red button, a letter of sympathy, the domino effects of life - a chain of events, all unforeseen. The chain of events of my life, of everyone's life, is not the road less traveled but the individual road that each life travels,

February 18, 1994 " And you want to travel with her, and you want to travel blind, and you think you'll trust her, for you've touched her perfect body with your mind."      Leonard Cohen  - Suzanne Anne, your smile was a false god, captivating and enticing, dazzling in its brilliance and charm - delicately deceiving in all that it promised. I met Anne the first day she was on campus, in late August 1968. I was in the administration building when Dean Norm Kaye came up to me and asked if I could give someone a ride to the dentist. He then introduced me to Anne and I immediately obliged. She was a transfer student from Saint Petersburg Junior College and like me, she was a junior and a literature major. And she was absolutely adorable. We became friends that day and as the school year progressed our friendship grew and deepened into love. And we learned that there were secrets we shared - depression and thoughts of suicide. I remember the last night I spent

February 17, 1994 In Memoriam "Man awaits his death dreading and hoping all."                                  William Butler Yeats - Death Do we await death dreading and hoping all? I believe we do, mostly silently and alone. Twenty-five years ago today I was a junior at Saint Leo College. And on that day, Monday February 17, 1969, Anne Riley Bennett sat silently and alone on the banks of the Hillsborough River in Tampa, Florida. A gun was in her right hand. She put the gun to her head and pulled the trigger, the gun misfired. She aimed towards the river, pulled the trigger and the gun fired. With the gun back beside her head, she pulled the trigger and again the gun misfired. Quickly, she pulled the trigger again, instant death!  And for me the beginning of a lifetime of regret and sorrow. A month later on Saint Patrick's Day, I attempted suicide for the first time. After drinking a pint of cheap whiskey and a six-pack of beer, I downed a bottle of Tylen

Part 1 - A Journal Towards Suicide For The Heart Cries is dedicated to the memory of George Leo Frawley and Anne Riley Bennett February 16, 1994 Ash Wednesday " Remember man that you are dust and into dust you shall return."                                                             Book of Genesis I begin with "A" words:  Andy, my dog, ambush,assault, attack, astonish, abuse, agony, abandonment, atonement, absolve, ashes - Absolutely Adorable Anne It is both appropriate and deliberate that I begin this journal on this day of Ash Wednesday.  It is also a coincidence of this year's calendar, but no matter - three months from today, I'll be dead.  For on Sunday May 15th, I am going to kill myself. For years I have thought of keeping a journal, but never took pen to paper until today. Why? Why now? Because I feel it is important to write about the final days of my life.  A suicide note, a message to my family, of my thoughts, fears, reflections,

Introduction & Forward Suicide is death by sadness and it is silent - but leaves loved ones with wounds that never heal. In January 1994 I decided to kill myself and choose Sunday May 15th as the perfect day. Suicide and depression were dark shadows that surrounded and squeezed me my entire life. When I was 11 years old my grandfather killed himself and twelve years later my college girlfriend committed suicide. In February 1994 I started a daily, detailed journal of not only what I was going through but also my thoughts, reflections, fears and feeling of time past and time present. It was to be my suicide note. Before my suicide, I decided to go to Florida in March and Ireland in April. For The Heart Cries is story and it is written in two parts - Part 1, A Journal Towards Suicide, Part 2, A Journey Back To Life..                                             Part 1 A Journal Towards Suicide I begin with a FORWARD In the beginning... Suicide is death by sadness and