This morning, at 9:30am, a young man walked onto the bridge, jumped the fence, tied a rope to the grill-siding and jumped to his death. The rope snapped and his body plummeted into the Russian River. He walked into the midspan of the pedestrian bridge, gracefully hoisted himself over the fence and expertly tied the last knot of his life. It hadn't occurred to me that I was witnessing the last moments of somebody's life until a while later...but as I sat there watching these carefully executed steps, he laid, dead, on Johnson's Beach. (The picture is from last week when Jadzy and I went on a walk to town; I've always loved how the bridge casts its shadow on the lazy River below.)I wanted to jump through the screen and stop him and scream, "How could you? Why our town? Why here? You're so young! And I know you belong to SOMEBODY! How could you do that to them?!" I half feel sad and half angry! A sort of personal violation, because not only am I deeply attached to this town, I'm also attached to THAT bridge! He jumped where Jesse and I said our vows on the day of our wedding. He splashed into the River of my childhood memories, and those of my children. He washed ashore on the beach where thousands upon thousands celebrate a moments worth of freedom. How could he desecrate these sacred things for us?
...but then...I thought again.
Although I never met him, I've heard much about him. Dasa, my brother-in-law and in spirit, took the same plunge from a bridge in Portland, Or. Did any of these thoughts cross his mind? He wasn't in his right mind at all, so probably yes but the need to do it far outweighed the effects it would have on those around him. Those like his family who would never see him or hear him again...and those in his family he would never meet. Or even the woman who came to work that day, to glance out her office window and discover his lifeless body dangling from the bridge. What came into HER mind? Was she consoled, too?Today, I feel like that woman...if ONLY I had been there 1 hour earlier, maybe I could have stopped him? Really, who knows why? I can honestly say, in my experience, that it was a mere thread that kept me from taking that same leap....those two little threads have kept me sane most my life: my children.
Dasa didn't have children, and I'm assuming this John Doe didn't, either.
So now what? Do I move on with my plans for the day? Or do I sit here and wallow in the sadness that surrounds me? Is it in their honor that I move on or is a disgrace? There's really no manual on how to deal with this kind of thing, not only in how to move on but also in honor of the dead. I'd rather not move on with my day as though nothing happened, but I also can't stop life from happening. Somewhere, a mother or father or brother or sister is getting a call that their loved one is dead, and I'm sitting here wondering how to go about the rest of my day because of it.
This evening, my family and I will be on the bridge to bid him a proper farewell. This cleansing of the bridge will help me to move beyond this tragedy, but also will help him move onto where he wants to be. He obviously did it for a reason, so I'll give him the benefit of the doubt that he made the right choice.
