Tyger Tyger, burning bright
Just pointed to a beautiful sunset over the water on our back porch. My wife looks and says "What are you pointing at? There's nothing out there..." I love Mary Hilton and her ability to observer ALL OF GODS CREATION.~ Originally posted to Facebook on June 6th, 2011 @ 8:50pm
The “On This Day” feature of Facebook is always pulling up interesting memories for me. Sometimes they are fun. Other times they are cause for reflection, showing me ways of thinking or language that I no longer agree with. They are often markers of the evolution of my life and the lives of the people around me.
This posting, a slice of normal daily life in our home, this is a darker moment. A few hours before I posted this, Xavier died. It would be another 100 minutes before the Steilacoom police knocked on our door to deliver that news. I have never seen this particular posting since I made it, and it really is hitting me pretty hard today.
It was this flux period between the worst event in my life happening and the point that I would eventually learn it had happened. There is a lag there that I find curious. My world was already broken in this moment but I was able to continue levity because I lacked that information.
In trying to understand death, suicide and Xavier’s last moments, I reconstructed his final 24 hours as completely as someone with my skill set can. I was obsessed, and during the next day I had access to his entire digital footprint. I know what photos he took. I know what phone calls he made and received. I have read his last text messages and emails during that final day. I tracked his location posthumously via a GPS locator app he kept installed. Without being right there with him I feel like I know as much as possible about his last day. There are holes though, at some point his cell phone was stolen and then a few hours later he was gone.
There came a point that I stopped putting the details together. Once Xavier was gone, the time of his death, that time was the last moment I inspected and searched out. It never occurred to me to think about or research what happened afterwards. This bit though, this is more of that story. It slots into the events of his last day.
I miss you so much. You are my first child, my nephew and my best friend all rolled together. I find myself constantly evaluating how I think you would have experienced a moment if you where still here. I miss your laugh. I miss how much salt you could dish and how much heart you put into everything you have done. I don’t know if anything lies beyond this life, but I know while I am still in it you are still alive.
This posting, a slice of normal daily life in our home, this is a darker moment. A few hours before I posted this, Xavier died. It would be another 100 minutes before the Steilacoom police knocked on our door to deliver that news. I have never seen this particular posting since I made it, and it really is hitting me pretty hard today.
It was this flux period between the worst event in my life happening and the point that I would eventually learn it had happened. There is a lag there that I find curious. My world was already broken in this moment but I was able to continue levity because I lacked that information.
In trying to understand death, suicide and Xavier’s last moments, I reconstructed his final 24 hours as completely as someone with my skill set can. I was obsessed, and during the next day I had access to his entire digital footprint. I know what photos he took. I know what phone calls he made and received. I have read his last text messages and emails during that final day. I tracked his location posthumously via a GPS locator app he kept installed. Without being right there with him I feel like I know as much as possible about his last day. There are holes though, at some point his cell phone was stolen and then a few hours later he was gone.
There came a point that I stopped putting the details together. Once Xavier was gone, the time of his death, that time was the last moment I inspected and searched out. It never occurred to me to think about or research what happened afterwards. This bit though, this is more of that story. It slots into the events of his last day.
I miss you so much. You are my first child, my nephew and my best friend all rolled together. I find myself constantly evaluating how I think you would have experienced a moment if you where still here. I miss your laugh. I miss how much salt you could dish and how much heart you put into everything you have done. I don’t know if anything lies beyond this life, but I know while I am still in it you are still alive.