I learned weeks ago why the ghosts took Scrooge to his past haunts. Some places take you back in time, with or without the apparitions.
My friend Candace killed herself when we were young and foolish enough to think that the world began and ended with the love of a boy. She ended her world shortly after the boy broke up with her, and changed all of ours as well. Her wake was held at Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic Church in Roebuck, where my nephew and niece happened to have their piano recital twelve years later.
Not knowing exactly where my little relatives would tap the keys, we first went to the chapel - the only building I had ever visited at the church. When we opened the doors I saw her casket again. Her almost-black hair straight and neat, her terrible makeup, her colorful-not-at-all-Candace dress. I think it was purple. I saw it all and I felt it all and the world didn't make sense, even with my little girl in my arms.
I wish there were a moral. I wish that there was some lesson that could be learned from her tragedy. I wish that some part of it made sense, or that after all of these years it wouldn't bring me to tears. But, there is none. It doesn't. It never will.
Suicide is selfish, irrational, thoughtless, cruel. But I'm not mad at suicide. I keep telling myself that I'm not mad at Candace anymore, either. I'm sad that it happened to her, sad that it happened to me, sad that it took so many lives with one bullet, one irrational obsession over one stupid boy - assuming that was at least part of the reason. But, I'll never know. And, it doesn't matter. It changes nothing.
The recital wasn't terrible. In years past I would have broken in such moments and turned to drink or long whining discussions with close friends, but the panic attacks and hopelessness have subsided. I woke from the nightmare, listened to the eager little voices sing their Christmas songs and the hopeful pianists pick their tunes and I packed my toddler into her car seat and headed to another Christmas party. I learned no lessons of tragic past and I do not keep Christmas every day of the year.
I will never forget Candace, though. May she rest in peace, and may we all learn to let her do so.
