No one dies alone

I just came back from an emergency trip to Jammu today, a family friend had committed suicide and I along with Mom, dashed off to offer condolences and be with the grieving family. It is indeed heart wrenching to see the demise of dear ones and witness the grief and pain of surviving family, moreso if you have grown up with them. What compounds the issue here is no one is sure if it is a suicide or murder, since the death happened under mysterious circumstances. Add to this the fact that the deceased was one of the wealthiest and most prominent businessmen in Jammu; the entire city is buzzing with all kinds of rumors and speculating on various possibilities and theories.

However it is very tough to accept someone known to you all these years could kill himself for no apparent reason. Even the family is confused and there is a sense of denial why someone would voluntarily go away. Two days of grieving, condoling and sympathizing has taken a toll on my body and mind as well, more intensified by the mystery shrouding the death. Its only today I am feeling somewhat better.

I believe suicide is a sign of cowardice and death will come to all, why invite it yourself. However there are many whose plight is one of suffering and cannot get away from a miserable life that they have been doomed to, and ultimately resort to this extreme step. For one they cannot escape from the clutches of their sad life, and the associated agony that they have to live with, which very few else will understand or empathize with. There are certain people in my life too, who I will not be very unhappy if they volunteer to go away. Death is a hard fact of life and end of everything, but a life with no hope or which deprives others of joys, is better not lived.

Tomorrow is my father’s death anniversary. Looking back I can just think how much my life has changed since he went away. Seven years back there was a sense of optimism and zeal I associated with my life, which unknowingly, I don’t know where, has disappeared. Its true that death is not a individual phenomena, there are many happy lives which are consigned to flames along with the cadaver.