Such a die-cast play on words!
Miss Icebreaker has gone for a winter break with her sister, Nanako, and I'm left behind in the cold.
Wait!
She's living in the brisk cold air up in the mountains and I'm snuggled up here in the warmth.
Ha ha ha ha!
I couldn't get any time away from my manacles and so I'm here with my nose at the grindstone and slaving away my hours.
Depressing isn't it?
I can tell you dear diary that there is no outlet for these mass depressions brought on by this and the quashed desires locked away in the dark recesses inside and in being constrained by wearing the straight jackets of regimented routines.
Sadly one of the workers on our ground floor committed suicide last Thursday. He and another person hanged themselves from the supporting beams in the communal cellars of his apartment block. Of course the company tries to keep closed lip about it but I would imagine as anywhere else, some of the details leak out and get mixed in with regular normal office gossip. Apparently his cell phone had a lot of messages from suicide groups. I think 'suicide group' chat rooms only exist in Japan, I have never heard of them being elsewhere. The act of committing suicide takes a single moment of desperation to overcome our basic survival instinct. It takes an act of bravery. As everyone knows it's easier to be a little braver when you have someone with you. These suicide groups are just people looking for a suicide mate and as quickly as the government close these sites down, they just reappear elsewhere.
When they opened his locker they found amongst his possessions, a copy of the manual of suicide, a book written over 15 years ago and is still in the high sales lists. The book wasn't banned like it would have been in most other countries because our criminal codes only seem to apply to graphic sexuality. We simply slapped an age restriction label on it to prevent teens buying it and even that was dependent upon the local authorities.
When did that stop them obtaining it you can ask yourself? Even in your country if there is something teens should not have I think you can think of instances of someone having it when you were in school with them. The book has been found with a lot of suicide victims from the fourteen year old girl who felt unable to live up to the expectations of her in school to the regular procession of businessmen who hang themselves in 'suicide forest'. The book itself does not present an unbiased reasoning into the ideas behind suicide. It actually asks the question 'why live?' and then gives chapters on how to commit suicide, the pain intensity, the length of time each method takes and the appearance of your body afterwards.
I am neither for nor against the book and I'd like to sit in my neutral position with this. My condolences for his wife and two children that now have to struggle on without him.
I know how it feels to stand on the edge of the precipice deep in contemplation of ending it all but I also know how it feels to desperately try to hold on when the fates would conspire to end it all for you. The official figures would indicate the one hundred people commit suicide here in Japan each and every day.
I don't know what's wrong here and I'm sure many others with cultures and philosophies different from ours may voice their opinions and suggestions. The suicide rate is high, the population becomes old and playgrounds lie empty and schools close due to a lack of babies being born. The government now tries to encourage the mindset of employers to employ married ladies with children and to ask young married couples to have children. Unfortunately this meets with the barriers of established mindsets and women protesting that we are human beings trying to live our lives in this society and we are not baby making machines.
I have three brothers. My two oldest are married and my youngest lives with his long time girlfriend and I'm with my girlfriend. From my Fathers four children then, only one son has produced one child. We are not a poor family and so we cannot blame financial pressures as any measure of restricting us but I think the way we live our lives with our commitments and our responsibilities and our social obligations have dictated our live style choices with regards to having or not having children.
Suicide is something I believe we all contemplate as some time in our lives and I feel it is a natural thing to do so. I personally feel it is the last act of desperation, where one feels there are no alternatives or no other avenues to take and to end life is the only option left. For various reasons that are as different as the people who take their own life, it is something I feel that will never truly be understood, because most leave nothing behind to give a clue as to why and loved ones are left to speculate.
Suicide is something that is no stranger to me. I lost my father to suicide, pills, alcohol and .25 semi automatic ended his existence. There were many reasons why we thought he would do such a thing, but it was my mom's sister that told us his reasons. He had called her the morning he took his life and told her that he felt as if he were a burden to his family, he was the man, the husband and the father that was the one who was responsible to see that his family was provided for, not one to be taken care of. He had bone cancer of the back and neck that was due to hard work all his life and from having broke his back on 3 separate occasions as I was growing. Then it was considered terminal and no cure, all they could do was remove affected bone and then fuse those areas with bone grafts. So maybe he felt guilty that he could not take care of his family, could have been all the pain and hardship he had suffered and then again it could have been the fact that no matter what he did to seek a cure, the outcome and diagnoses would always be the same.
Very insightful of you to post this, thank you Momo.
Later...
Smiling Pig
February 22, 2010 1:50 AMIt shocked me to read that about 100 people commit suicide each day in Japan. I remember watching a programme about a famous Japanese writer,Yukio Mishima, who commited suicide in a very public way.
I hope I never feel that desperate that I want to end it all.
Unknown
February 23, 2010 1:38 PM