"To be, or not to be; that is the question." (Hamlet)

"I will drink life to the lees: all times I have enjoy'd

Greatly, have suffered greatly, both with those

That loved me, and alone."  (Tennyson)

.....Just a couple of comments on the comments posted on my "suicide" blog yesterday.  First off, cuzzin Ruthie of Britain, it wasn't I who said that suicide was cowardly--Napoleon did; and I haven't had the pleasure of an opportunity to meet him and ask him why he feels that way.  And as for one of my favorite all-time Hall of Fame students, Bob Fox, I was unaware that he had the knowledge of the nature of PTSD,   which he obviously has, but I'm glad that my posting touched a nerve of his, and I'm very impressed about his experience.  Probably my first experience with the trauma that brings on the kind of depression that leads to post-traumatic stress, was when I fi came to understand that my father was different from other kids' fathers; he had no legs and only one arm.  Of course, this was a result of gas poisoning in WWI, and when I understood this I became really pissed at the Germans.  I was about five or six, and I vowed that someday I would gain revenge.  Who knew?

.....After my dad died in 1933, we were too poor to remain in the relative peace and quiet by the beach in New Jersey, and so we had to move to the roughest, crime-ridden area in Fort Apache in the South Bronx, and took up residence in my maternal grandparents' roach-ridden apartment. That really brought on depression; and I was only nine.  I missed my friends, and missed the easy life I had in Long Branch.  I suppose at that time I was pretty close to what is now known as PTSD.  But now, as I remember, the very first times I had a traumatic experience, but didn't know it, was the day I was born out of a warm and comforting compartment, and cast like a Steinbeck Okie directly into the Great Depression.  Following that fardel, another trauma, only a couple of weeks later, was my circumcision, which was unceremoniously accomplished without my permission and in direct violation of the Bill of Rights. 

.....But in all seriousness, I could say much more about my suicidal tendencies in my 20s following my war experiences, but that time is history, and my fortune now, with my amazing wife, is to enjoy whatever I have left of life, and to deal as best I can with its "slings and arrows."  I have learned my lesson well in that regard.