about five years ago a neighbor of mine committed suicide. it was meticulously planned & carried out in the most thoughtful manner possible; this struck me as an unusual way to approach what amounts to a desperate last act.
he gave no outward indication of his intentions during his final weeks; instead, he was laying out his cover story, a planned medical procedure that would have him out of the house for several days. he arranged for his bird to be cared for with another neighbor; he delivered the animal right on schedule, the last time anyone saw him alive.
the neighbor watching the bird had keys to the apartment. after several days, he went to check on things & found the suicide note — written in marker on a piece of cardboard about 3 feet high by 5 feet wide — & its author dead of a self-inflicted shotgun wound to the head.
he had been sick for several years, in constant pain with no hope for recovery, yet no end in sight. he was unable to work & living alone, in poverty. he apologized for the inconvenience of his death. there were three envelopes taped to the cardboard, containing his will, letters to relatives, & copies of bank & vehicle records, all very neat & organized.
down to the last line of the note, a line scrawled in large angry (or terrified) letters, with a different pen, a red one, apparently as an afterthought:
“THE LIZARDS ARE OUT THERE”
the lizards are out there. now, lizards have never really bothered me, but i know what he meant. it’s the same way with spiders — you know, there are always spiders. the ones you see, & the ones you don’t. spiders are far more aware of us than we are of them. we walk in a room, the spiders there know. but how often do spiders walk unseen, unknown, through our rooms, all amongst us? often indeed, believe you me.
the lizards are out there.
That’s the creepy beginning to a really good short story.
Real life is so much more interesting than fiction sometimes.
I’m a bit confused about the significance of the lizards (or spiders) in this story. What are you trying to say here?
Well, I know where the lizards are around here. In aquariums in people’s homes. Good thing about living in the north.
As for spiders, they’re everywhere. *Shudders*
once upon a time there was a site called poetcam.com. it went away. this was a featured non-fiction story on that site — you can tell the age of the thing by the ampersands, which along with the all lowercase, was my signature way of writing then. i found this on my h/d and copy/pasted it in its entirety. completely non-fictional in case you’re wondering.
i’ve since learned to type out the word and.
It reminded me of the time I commented on “How I don’t hear the laughter anymore”, and everyone immediately remembered that what Freddy Prinze (not Jr.) said before he killed himself.
You were scaring me there for a minute… DON’T DO THAT!
non-fiction is often scary. sorry i scared you with it.
for the record, life’s good, and i’m fine.
Sadly, no…
Heh…
“Now children, when Dan and I were young…”
oh come on you guys. i remember that too, and i’m … uh, never mind.
Speaking of rock n’ roll (we were?), is that a photo of a band that rotates through on the pink set? If so, what band?
wow. heavy stuff ms. k.d. & i’m really glad it wasn’t true. although- somewhere out “there”, someone really is afrain of those “lizards”. i actually feed “my” lizards.
ps- isn’t the weather today just grand?!
YES the lizards are still out there……….along with the spiders………..and all kinds of monsters. I know. I hear them trying to get me at night!
Are these the same lizards we’re trying to keep out of office? I’m confused. *wanders off toward the coffeepot*
for a wonderful film about dying by choice see ‘Night Mother. Sissy Spacek and Anne Bancroft are wonderful.
also meant to say:
yeah, the lizards are definitely out there. tho’ they seem to be dying off a bit.
Linky: that is raging arb and the redheads. this post is about the night i went to see them. really fun band, they had a full-on kegger going on the stage.
i hadn’t looked at it that way, but it certainly could have been those lizards.
…and the ants man, everywhere, but when I look right at them they disappear…
oh. remind me to tell you about the acid trip with the ants, someday.
in the mini-series V, they, too, were lizards.
As were the Sleestacks (sp?) on Land of the Lost.
I think maybe we’re just really glad we evolved along the simian line as opposed to the reptilian.
Jason, you have invoked the holy V and thus made me a very happy monkey. Every moment of the miniseries and movie was awful, but I love it so.
So, kd, I think our ceremony should involve lots of liquor. Your thoughts?
The spiders are everywhere.
I love it.
Yes, I’m fixated, and I know it. It’s a beautiful story, if a bizarre one, in the sense of simply being unusual. It makes a powerful case for the ability to die with painless dignity through one’s own choice, something that the United States still does not allow, and may never, sadly.
I can hope, though.
Am I the only one old enough to remember Jim Morrison calling himself “The Lizard King?”
*pulls coverlet over head*
kd, is there a ceremony we can perform or something that will end with you as my adopted big sister? Me, I thought that was just beautiful. Sigh. You know you’re my hero in all the ways that count.
-Weird, sentimental Monkey
i love you muchly, my Monkey, and anytime you wanna big sis, that would be me right here. let me shake my head clear of goodbye yellow brick road, which currently has me in it’s thrall, and we’ll get all ceremonious.
or can we just get ceremonious to grey seal?
mercy, i oughta be in bed.