Time
Sometimes.. when it all got too heavy, as a child I went to a place in my head, crawling up on the veranda of a huge old house in the middle of a field of tall grass and wildflowers. No matter where I was - sitting watching my mother knock back the valium with a tall glass of vodka - or listening to her and my father fight, It took me out of the frey to a place none of it could touch me.

That veranda got a lot of use over the years. I still go there.

I've talked about my suicide attempt(s) here before. Despair is a powerful moment, and when your in it, it can sweep you away. When I was a kid I always looked as suicide as a cowards way out, at 15 when my friend Danny killed himself in the garage of his mother's house, I was furious. How could he just give it all away? I never thought about the pain he must have been in inside. I wouldn't understand that for years.

What Danny didn't believe was that life could change, and that no matter how dark and desperate things get, there is always hope that tomorrow could change everything. Years later, I almost forgot that too. I lost my way to that house. It is hard to grasp sometimes, when what you see is your world crashing in around you.. the weight of things seems so great your heart will burst if you have to endure another minute.

Looking back now - I know what Danny felt, that despair.. I still feel it from time to time. Suicide is the end of hope for all time. The insidious thing about it is that you don't know when someone has given up hope. More often than not they conceal it well.

Life turns on a dime sometimes, and it may often take everything you have to hold on.. but if you do remarkable things can happen.