Interview with a Suicider

Today I sit down with with Dylan, the man who has just performed suicide via a 9mm pistol.

Interviewer: How was it?

Dylan: I was worried it’d knock most of my bottom teeth out after the recoil because I can’t open my mouth super wide. Turns out it happens so fast, I was only left with a little tooth scrape. Which I kind of equate to nails on a chalkboard. So not super great overall. But here I am.

Interviewer: Ah yes, nothing like a good tooth scape to give you chills down the spine.

Dylan: I completely agree, in fact, I also dislike to the same passion, holes in nature that are out of place. I saw some flowers or something the other day that were truly revolting. I wished to obliterate them immediately so I left the area.

Interviewer: So now I must ask, how has being a suicider affected your life?

Dylan: I’m the first suicider I know of I’ll tell you that much. Since I’ve pulled the trigger, life has never been better!

Interviewer: How so?

Dylan: Before, it was all “relations and I don’t knows, uncertainties and piecing together truths, ideals then failures…” I could go on and on with metaphors so exquisite, readers would be bored. In short, it was a lot of work for a lot of bullshit.

It helps to note that I am lazy, by preference, and I’ve tried the other way too.

Interviewer: And now?

Dylan: Well, now it’s just so easy! I also would love to give credit to the creator of hollow point bullets as to greatly ensure victory. My greatest fear was that I’d have to limp around half-retarded with a disfigured face!

Now I have the greatest peace of mind, greater than any living man or woman on earth. Do you know why that is? Because I made a choice and I don’t have to live with it!

Interviewer: And how does your choice affect the life that is still alive? Many consider suicide to be selfish, an act of ultimate ignorance, weakness, and filth. Others compare it to denying God, abhorring the unity of life itself.

Dylan: I can guess that some will be sad, some with feel bad for those that are sad, and some don’t care or don’t know. As to denying God, I’m not sure I understand what the general consensus is on that.

Interviewer: What I mean to ask is, do you not feel sadness or regret for those lives you’ve irrevocably changed because of your actions?

Dylan: That’s impossible because I am dead. Before I pulled the trigger however, I did ask myself that very same question. The conclusion I came to is that however anyone feels is their own doing. I haven’t physically harmed them, although they might think it true. In all honesty, from beyond the grave, I think it’s a bit funny if they take it personally.

Interviewer: That’s a bit sadistic don’t you think?

Dylan: Well of course it is!

Interviewer: And you don’t have a problem with that?

Dylan: That’s a bit sadistic don’t you think?

Interviewer: Touché. Of course I’m not supposed to give my opinion because I’m an interviewer.

Dylan: In some ways, you are more dead than I.

Interviewer: I’ll pretend I know what you mean by that. Well now, what I’m sure most have been wondering is did it hurt?

Dylan: The act itself you mean? No not a bit.

Interviewer: Was there any feeling whatsoever?

Dylan: There was that feeling of drainage, kinda like when your sinuses clear upwards and then away from your mouth. Or is that just me? Anyways, I knew it was gonna be loud so I wore earmuffs. It was still loud. But it was all painless.

Interviewer: What happened next?

Dylan: Well my vision started fading like when you stand up too fast, and I think I twitched my left finger just to try it. And then, nothing. Like when you’re sleeping and not dreaming. Zero awareness.

Interviewer: But here you are now talking to me.

Dylan: I know, isn’t that just something!

Interviewer: Yes, I suppose, but maybe our reader is left wondering how we’re talking to begin with.

Dylan: How lucky they are!

Interviewer: Is there anything you miss from the living world?

Dylan: I wouldn’t know! But if I think about it, probably sinning! There’s just something about putting your foot down and saying fuck orthodoxy!

Interviewer: Are you in any way religious?

Dylan: Eh, not really. I see the value and certain relations between adoption of principles and outcome, but for me it was really too much work to be religious. I’d rather just read about it or see other people do it.

Interviewer: So why do suicide?

Dylan: I had this fixation that I couldn’t fix, an itch I couldn’t itch, a resolve I couldn’t resolve. And then I said no I don’t, and I didn’t have those problems anymore. But then eventually then fixation, the itch, and the resolve appeared again. So on and so forth. I did this for 26 years, can you believe it? I was always just like, “oh yeah, wait I’ll just try this thing, or read this, or be this or do this, and say this, etc etc…” This was my internal dialogue. I’m not the guy who tried everything either, just some regular ‘here’s a struggle, try and solve it’ type. Solved a lot. Did a lot. Realized that I wasn’t those things particularly, like I saw myself doing them but I wasn’t them? I think the Eastern philosophies explain this.

And I just said nah I’m good. Had this pistol I picked up from some guy in a Wal-Mart parking lot for a few years that’s been sitting doing nothing. It was an easy choice for me.

Interviewer: So you felt the struggle of living wasn’t worth living?

Dylan: That’s exactly right. And I had the guile to pull that trigger. Did you know that suicide used to be illegal in most places of the world? I find that utterly hilarious. In Louis XIV’s time they would take the dead person’s body, draw it through the streets face down and then hang it or throw it on a garbage heap in addition to taking all their property! I think Louis really got it, you know?!

Interviewer: Is that not cowardice?

Dylan: Cowardice comes from fear and self-concern. You would better ask those that had a “suicide attempt”.

Interviewer: Had you previously attempted suicide before this?

Dylan: I used to doddle with the pistol here and there, imagining what it would be like right before that moment, hammer pulled back, fully loaded, etc. But I never followed through. And there were never any other methods I tried like jumping a bridge or pill popping etc… Although I have fantasized a toaster in the bathtub just because I think it’s so ridiculous and entertaining.

Interviewer: So would you say you lived your life, before the suicide of course, like someone who had nothing to lose?

Dylan: This is a very interesting question. I think before I decided to suicide, I felt there were things I was leaving behind; opportunities, choices, all the things and possible thoughts that could or ever were to be conceived, people, etc. The universe of possibility. And then I realized I didn’t have to continue living to experience those things. This would seem delusional. But I asked myself, is it delusional to keep doing something I don’t enjoy to reap obstacles that require work?

I’m lazy. I don’t like most work. And I sympathize with the people scoffing at that. To them I say, I am grateful for a pistol with hollow point rounds, because not everyone is afforded that opportunity.

Interviewer: Very humble. Now that you are among the non-living, now that you are dead, do you suppose you will return to living once again?

Dylan: I have no idea how to wrap my head around how that’s possible. But maybe? I figure this might get boring eventually, just having all this eternal bliss and contentment, no overhead, etc. At some point will I wish to return to living again? Maybe. For now I can certainly say this is great how it is.

Interviewer: How do you feel about the people who will read this interview and decide to follow the same path you have?

Dylan: I think Emerson said it best, imitation is suicide. So in addition to the suicide you would be following by my steps, you would also be ignoring who you are, in essence another suicide. I mean I’d really hate to be having this interview with you right now if my suicide wasn’t an original thought.