Over the weekend a gay man named Dalton Robertson disappeared on what was assumed to be a trip to Palm Springs. In fact, unknown to his partner of 12 years, and to his worried family and friends, he went to a hotel in Long Beach, and intentionally overdosed.
Dalton had been sober for 18 years, and was very well-loved. I did not know him personally, but the gay recovery community in Los Angeles is like a large high school. You may not know everybody, but you’ve been in the same room at least once, and know their face and have likely heard them speak. We are all rather shaken. It brings home the reality that addiction and alcoholism and AIDS are not the only toxic illnesses.
My opinion on suicide is somewhat out of the mainstream. It is said that it’s “a permanent solution to a temporary problem” but that’s not always true. Sometimes depression is not temporary, in some people it seems to be a permanent fixture that dogs them relentlessly over their entire life. They often try every remedy imaginable, and nothing offers the needed relief. I don’t know enough about Dalton’s past to know whether this was the case, but I know if the steps of AA, over 18 years, do not work to alleviate despair, than it is a deep and perhaps untreatable condition. In that case, suicide can be seen as the only option to alleviate such despair.
Of course it invariably leaves behind shattered hearts. By all means, the survivors need to grieve for him, and for themselves. It would not be human for anyone not to get angry at the one who died as well. But ultimately, I think the challenge is to try to forgive the suicide. No one endures such pain by choice, it is not their fault. They simply must end their suffering. They may be simply deferring experiences on a karmic journey, they may be dropping into nothingness, they may be confronting an uneasy afterlife, I have no idea. But it does end the pain, and I personally cannot judge anyone who takes his own life unless I know what that pain is like, and could say that in their place, I would endure it.
I took Gaza for a mega-hike in Griffith Park this morning, all the way up to the observatory and back. It is a sure route to appreciate how much joy can be found in the simple things in life. Just watching him play navigator, staying 50 paces in front of me and fending off a host of imagined dangers, was better than sipping a fine wine. It also succeeded in completely wiping me out, so I must nap. How lucky I am to be able to do that—for one more day at least. Tomorrow I start on the subtitle editing.
MCO 2005
