I am extremely liberal. I honestly don't care what people say or do as long as they don't hurt others intentionally or infringe on others' ability to say or do what they want.
Go get drunk.
Go fuck the entire cheer squad.
Go smoke weed and meander around campus high as a bird.
Tell me about all of it.
It's cool. Have fun. Do what you want; it's your life.
This is true in all cases but one. The one sole statement I can't ever deal with hearing from my friends, the one thing that will immediately change my mood to angry and depressed is "I'm gonna kill myself."
I don't care if they're joking. I don't care if it was just a statement in passing. I don't care how many times they say "I don't really mean it! I'm just kidding!"
Fuck you. DO NOT JOKE ABOUT KILLING YOURSELF. EVER.
I have had so many friends who have called me in the middle of the night to tell me they were about to drive to the nearest bridge, to tell me they wanted to die right then, that they hate their life and they hate feeling helpless and they hate being alone and they feel like no one loves them and no one cares and that no one would be there for them and that no one would care if they just died right then.
And every time I got a call and I heard the sobbing, frantic, or just apathetic voice I dipped into that feeling of loneliness, of helplessness. I couldn't help them. I didn't know what to do to help them. They weren't always best friends...they occasionally were acquaintances who just felt like they could talk to me. But all the same, my love for life and living made it so difficult to deal with the idea of someone I know ending his life--oddly enough, all of the calls were from guys. I just had to listen and talk to them. Calm them down and try my damnedest to reaffirm their appreciation of life.
So now, whenever someone I know, particularly when they are personally close to me, says that they are going to commit suicide, that they wish they were dead, that they're going to jump off a building, or slit their wrists, all of these emotions and feelings of helplessness, all the sleepless nights and teary conversations, all the fear of what might happen between when I hung up and when I saw them next, come flooding back to me full force. I go to bed and I worry. I can't even contemplate what I would do if someone ever said it and then went through with it. It's unthinkable.
I again state, DO NOT JOKE ABOUT KILLING YOURSELF.
It's stupid. It hurts. It's not funny.
