Sleeper

Sometimes it takes all my effort not to lie down on the railway line. 

I mean all my effort, every fibre of my being intensely concentrated on clinging on to clinging on. I did not want to get up and face the day, go to work. Then when I was at work I did not want to go home. I did not want to be anywhere. I did not want to be.

After those boys got killed in the miners strike, coal picking on the spoil tip, I used to dream about their death, rattling black rushing down and pinning them under its dark weight until the dust stopped their breath. This part of my life feels like that dream. One wave after another of black dirt piling down, heavier and heavier until I can hardly urge my chest to rise and fall under its burden.

I always wondered whether, when it was time, I might be able to simply let go of the will to carry on -  and find that I just gently slid over the edge of the sunset. I thought this might be when I was ninety or so.  Now I can vouch for the fact that wishing you weren't here doesn't make it so. 

Death by my own hand holds a terrible allure like the urge to approach the edge of a waterfall. Two problems though. Firstly, the children. Secondly, the life insurance doesn't pay out. I'm resigned to crashing my car and making it look like an accident, although this also has two problems. Firstly, I might injure someone else. Secondly, I might not die but be horribly injured, trapped in mangled wreckage being cut free for hours then permanently maimed but still alive. So, yes, I guess life could be even worse than this. And interesting that I am much more afraid of being injured than being killed, more scared of living than of dying.

Lack of real imminent possibility (this evening at least) does not prevent me from having a list in my head of favorite spots.

1. Drop off the back of the ferry in the dead of night.

2. The viaduct at the port.

3. In the sea with stones in my pocket.

4. Beachy Head.

All of these places are far enough from home, far enough from anywhere I normally am,  to give me time to reconsider. Perhaps that's no coincidence. Not tonight, Josephine.