Confession

It wasn’t until a few days ago that I had ever heard the name of Aaron Swartz. And I have no excuse, save that the Internet is a big place. I should have known who he was. And now that I do, I don’t know what to say.

I’m dumbstruck.

If you peruse Aaron’s list of achievements, you can discern, in about 20 seconds, that he was special. One of those rare souls who believed in living honestly. Believed it too much, maybe. I can only make conjectures. I didn’t know the man.

Affections

I will say however, that I am a person who knows affections. Last year, one of my favorite poetry professors in college died. He was an atheist, I was a Christian. We didn’t always see matters in the same light.

But we both struggled with depression. He struggled with alcoholism. I remember one semester, he just stopped coming to class. And I worried he was going to kill himself. He couldn’t watch the news because the stories got under his skin. He would think about them and think some more and become overwhelmed.

Then he had to drink.

I live in Santa Barbara, California. I can safely say that it’s one of the most beautiful places that a person can live in this world. The temperature is between 64 and 84, on average. We have 300+ days of sunshine a year. I have a comfortable job, a loving wife, no financial stress.

But I don’t read the news. I listen to NPR in the morning. I skim CNN and the Huffington Post once or twice a day. The only time I read something through is when I visit Daring Fireball. I don’t watch normal television. Only Netflix, Hulu, and Twitter.

I live in a bubble because it helps with the depression. I haven’t had any symptoms for years.

Grace and Luck

It’s only by grace and luck that I haven’t taken a header off some tower before now. I can only imagine Aaron’s state of mind. I can only empathize with what he might have been feeling and thinking.

I can only ascertain that he must have been drowning.

Depression, and all that comes with it, lies dormant under my surface. It would take only a few well-coordinated circumstances to throw me back under. Not much at all, really.

And when I read of people, like Aaron Swartz, committing suicide, I am the last person to get angry about it. Yes, it’s absolutely selfish. Yes, there were other, better options. Yes, yes, yes to all of your objections.

But I still understand. Do I agree? Of course not. But I understand. I’ve been there.

You don’t have to sink very far below the ocean surface before you lose sight of the sun. Before everyone and everything you care about no longer carries their proper weight in your heart. It doesn’t take much at all. The problem with depression, it turns out, is treading water.

You just get tired of doing it.