Archive for November, 2007

The holiday season has officially begun. The sounds of Saturday afternoon traffic jams. Christmas choirs of preschoolers singing about Rudolph in the key of H. Bell ringers in front of popular shopping areas giving out season’s greetings and shame with every tone of their bells. Gaudy lights of multiple colors strung about shrubbery and nativity scenes that include not only the shepherds and four wise men but also Santa and Frosty the snowman.

In the air are the odors of yuletide glee. From scotch pines to home made candies. Eggnog and roasted ham. Hand made tamales and steaming mugs of hot cocoa and the slightly revolting smells of children who have gotten a bit too excited while standing in line to visit their local Santa impersonator.

The day after our tryptophan induced slumber it hits us with a full attack on our senses. We turn on the radio only to hear seasonal music ringing across the airwaves. Whether it’s a rendition of Jingle Bell Rock or The Little Drummer Boy there is no escaping it… Christmas time is here.

With the holidays comes excitement for many, and sad tidings for quite a few as well. With such frivolity ensuing all around us, there are a few of us who just can’t cope with the joy and happiness that appears to be thrust down our collective throats. For these people the holidays are not an invitation to happy celebrations, but are in fact a mockery of their depression that just might push them beyond the edge of sanity.

Some of these people quietly disappear into their own worlds for a time until this season passes. Others have an epiphany and join us in our celebrations. Still others bid the cold cruel world goodbye, leaving those they leave behind nothing to open on Christmas day other than another box of Kleenex as they wipe away another wave of tears.

Today, just two days after Thanksgiving, I sit here and prepare to assist my dear friend Agatha in her suicide. Morals be damned, she is old and suffers through each day as if it is her last already. Suffering from an incurable virus that will only eat away at her memory and destroy her motor skills until all that remains would be a shadow of her formal self that would just sit there breathing loudly with the sounds of a death rattle buzzing about her.

Agatha is an amazing old gal, When I first met her six years ago I was impressed, not only due to her quickness and beauty but also by the fact that she truly understood me in a way no other had before. We would spend so much time together my girlfriend became jealous many a time, even though we explained repeatedly that our relationship wasn’t at all like that. I never had the heart to tell my girlfriend that though we were never intimate, there were moments where I pondered what it would have been like if we had.

Agatha became ill about 2 years ago. When she told me that things just didn’t feel right with her I insisted on helping her find the right medical attention. Different facilities offered similar programs in order to combat the virus, but in the end Agatha was doomed. In a way Agatha’s problem was akin to Alzheimer’s, yet it was far more rapid than we expected. It ravaged her completely and within 6 months of her initial diagnosis she was placed under an order from her medical advisors to never leave home again. Being the kind soul I am I converted my office to accommodate her needs and there she resided. Never once leaving my home again.

Over the past two years I have watched my dear friend struggle to stay alive. With no other family than me and my girlfriend Agatha did her best to be there for us every day… what a trooper. In the middle of the night when I was burdened with insomnia, I would find Agatha waiting for me, wide awake as well and ready to play a few hands of cribbage. We’d share moments of silence together as we whittled away the hours until sunlight broke the eastern sky.

As time passed I could see how that virus was killing her. It took chunks of her away as every day passed. Slowly chopping away all that she ever was, or ever could be. One day she would be completely coherent and the next she was babbling endlessly about topics that held no interest for her or anyone else for that matter. She gave me quite a few scares over the past year as well, often leaving me wondering if she would even live another day.

Agatha and I spoke of her predicament endlessly and I knew there would come a day when I would have to pull her plug.

Sadly today is that day.

So for the very last time I sit here if my office, Typing away on Agatha’s keyboard for the very last time. Writing down this post of her final moments with me, and sharing them with you.

Goodbye Agatha, you have been a dear friend and a grand laptop computer as well and I shall miss you greatly. Gone but not forgotten, and though my grief clouds my mind from rational thought I knew I had to get a replacement for you and so on Black Friday I purchased another laptop whom I have named Bruno jr.

May you find peace in silicon heaven Agatha; I loved you and will always cherish our time together.