A Not-Beautiful Death

A bottle, a wall, a waste

the wall… on a different day

This wall reminds me of my dead sister. I stare at the wall. The wall stares back at me.

I’m surprised to find that it reminds me of her. I’m surprised to find that I’m surprised. I shouldn’t be. It’s almost been seven years, but everything still does. Remind me of her, that is.

This temporary wall is adjacent to a parking lot at work. It’s made of modular metal panels, enclosing a space about 50’x80’. Though it’s supposed to be temporary, it’s been here for years now. I have no idea how long ago it was put up. I’ve probably seen it over a thousand times.

The wall encloses construction materials from drawn out projects around the building. Just inside the wall there’s also a chain link fence with barbed wire on top. It seems like overkill, especially since every time I’ve driven by the temporary gate on the temporary wall it’s been left wide open. There’s no protection from the elements either; there’s no roof, not even a contraption of tarps. The wall and the fence and the barbed wire inside all seem completely pointless. But here it is. And here I am.

I’ve arrived at work early. Early enough to have a few minutes to myself, so I set my timer to meditate for 10 minutes. I feel better when I meditate in the morning, so I’m proud of myself for getting in early enough to sit in my car and do so. This parking lot feels safe enough to close my eyes; the only people around are people who work here. I crack my window; there’s a cool bite to the spring morning air.

I hit the “start” button and the starting gong chimes. Dooooooooonggggggggg.

I close my eyes, but they don’t want to stay shut. My eyelids repel each other like same-poled magnets. I find myself staring at this wall.

For a moment, I’m agitated with myself. That happens. I try closing my eyes again. They open again, of their own accord. I relent. Fine. I let my gaze soften on the wall. This stupid bland wall that serves no purpose. Well, except for commandeering my meditation time, I’ll give it that. Well played, wall.

I would have sworn this wall is tan, but now I see that it’s not. It strikes me as odd, how certain I would’ve been. And how wrong. Maybe it was tan at some point, but it’s green. To be fair, a tannish-green. A tannish-green with a bluish undertone, especially on the north-facing ridges. At first the blue seems to be a trick of the leftover sunrise, the sky reflecting back at itself. I’m disenchanted to realize it’s just an uneven paint job. Fitting for this makeshift nature blocker. There are trees beyond, and foothills. I try again to close my eyes. Nope.

This morning the sky is broad, bright, blue. I can spot some tree tops if I look up beyond the wall. But the wall is right in front of me, and it has me captivated. The longer I stare at it, the more it seems to reveal an iridescent quality from the different colored layers of thinly applied spray paint. A visible history of the cheapest paint that was available the past few times the wall was relocated. I feel bad for the wall, for a second. Poor thing, wanting to look presentable.

I chuckle to myself and find a few calm moments. My eyes rest on the wall, noticing more about it with each passing breath. There’s a burnt sienna color revealed in places. Rust, I think, at first. But it’s an earlier, thicker layer of paint showing through from beneath the tan-green-blue sheens. More remnants of the wall’s former life. These dark spots have been revealed by weather, wear, chipping, scuffing. I notice nicks and dents and other imperfections in the wall which make it instantly infinitely more interesting. Direct daylight now floods the wall, amplifying the impression of all the different colors coming through at the same time. It’s kind of stunning in its own way; a zoomed-in cutaway could be a piece of art. I catch myself in the thought, “this wall is surprisingly beautiful, I can’t believe I never really noticed it before.”

That’s what makes me think about my sister Sarah. She found beauty everywhere. She sought it actively. She embodied it, pursued it, cultivated it, drew it out from others.

I wonder if Sarah sought beauty because she couldn’t perceive her own. Or if she sought beauty in a desperate attempt to find positive contrast in the world and her existence that she ultimately found so intolerable.

I wonder if she sought beauty out of joy, expansion, the pleasure of perceiving it and sharing it with others. She seemed sincere in its pursuit, sometimes even childlike. She was playful, passionate, hilarious, wildly creative.

I want to linger in those memories.

How she watched the sunrise and sunset whenever possible, and was always in awe of it whether the sky was dramatic or dull. How she could refurbish a decrepit coffee table into a charming centerpiece. How she would sincerely seek something in a stranger to compliment to brighten their day. How she could see the best in anyone, and speak life to it in such a way that they would see it and believe it about themselves too, even if only temporarily.

I remember how excited she was when she was in art school, how she’d told me about a set design class she was taking. She’d been eager to learn about it and really enjoyed it, but later she said it kind of ruined movies and TV for her. She said she couldn’t watch anything without building out the rest of the set in her mind, seeing it in her imagination beyond the edges of the screen. I remember how she held her hands up in two L-shapes, mimicking the frame.

And just like that I’m thinking about her death instead of her life.

This memory called to mind something that the detective had mentioned to mom which mom told me. The detective said the room felt staged. There had been a mostly full bottle of gin placed in the middle of the floor with the label towards the bedroom door. The detective said it felt somehow intentional. The autopsy report showed that Sarah hadn’t been drinking. And when she did drink, she wasn’t known to favor gin.

Dooooooooonggggggggg. The halfway timer sounds. It’s been five minutes. That’s my notification to acknowledge the passage of time, to regroup if needed. I make a conscious decision to stay with my thinking, to see it through. To see if it leads to any meaningful conclusion. Any resolution. I know better. It usually doesn’t. But I have an eerie calmness this morning and it feels strangely good to sit with it. It’s not that often that I can think about Sarah like this without coming unseamed.

The wall stares at me. I stare back at the wall, now just a backdrop as I watch my mind. I’m back to the room, the bottle, the setting of the stage.

The bottle is a small thing, possibly inconsequential. I didn’t see it with my own eyes, but it registers as important since the detective thought to mention it. Since mom passed it on. I’m disturbed at how readily I can imagine Sarah going to the trouble of setting the scene. I can only assume the bottle had some pretty design on it. It feels incredibly dark, both me thinking about it, and her going to the trouble. I can see her though, distraught, considering the composition of the room in two dimensions, through a camera lens, from someone else’s perspective. The floor, the walls, the bed, projecting herself into that space and imagining what it would look like when someone walked in to find her dead.

It doesn’t comfort me to think that maybe she wanted to make her death beautiful too, to treat it like a canvas. But it does fit her personality, her talents, her neuroses.

But, it wasn’t beautiful.

I tell myself that in those moments she wasn’t thinking clearly. She was confused. Whether she was pursuing beauty or drama or contrast or chaos in the scene, it was a waste. Her death was a waste. It was all a waste. There was nothing beautiful about it, despite her possible last efforts.

Staring at the wall, I suddenly feel foolish for making it beautiful. It is beautiful, sure. But only in some janky, grasping, pathetic way. I want beauty to redeem death, but that’s not practical. I want everything to mean something, but not everything does. I suppose Sarah did too. I wish I could ask her, could somehow know. About everything I never knew about her. About the bottle. About her decision.

My mind has run the gamut of what it wanted to consider this morning. Of what it could handle. I feel that. No questions are answered. But for now I am everywhere and nowhere at the same time. I’m in the only place I can be, right here. Sitting in my car, staring at this wall. A breeze shifts the air in the car, a gentle coolness brushes up against the left side of my face. I feel my lungs expand as I inhale. I’m grateful for this morning, this time. I’m grateful to have known Sarah. But I’m sad too. I miss her. I wonder if Sarah is here too. In the only place she can possibly be. Everywhere and nowhere at all.

Dooooooooonggggggggg, dooooooooonggggggggg, doooooooonggggggggg. The final bell sounds and resonates quietly for a good 30 seconds.

I stare at the wall and the wall stares back at me.

I stare and marvel at how the mind makes these leaps from one jumping off point to another. The ugly wall. The beautiful ugly wall. My beautiful sister who found beauty in everything. The realization that she would have found beauty in this wall. The brutal reckoning that she can’t find beauty in this wall because she’s dead. The morbid thought that she maybe tried to make her suicide beautiful. The blunt fact that there is nothing beautiful in suicide. The glory and the futility of seeking beauty in this stupid wall. The cold fact that this wall is just here, just like Sarah’s suicide. It’s just there. It’s just here. It’s just everywhere. It’s just always.

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Thanks to CansaFis, Cam, and Josh for your graciousness & feedback.

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