The Dark Coda, Part II

After such knowledge, what forgiveness?
                          T.S. Eliot


The death of 81-year-old Gewynn Taylor and the arrest of her husband, George, 86, which started as a mystery, is now unfolding as a tragically familiar horror show.  According to today's Tribune, George and his wife decided to commit suicide because George was feeling depressed.

It gets worse:  As the Tribune reports, the park ranger stopped George in Montana de Oro State Park at 11:30 p.m.  Gewynn's body was in the back seat, a plastic bag tightly fastened around her head.  George told the ranger that she "has been dead since sunset," that they had a suicide pact and that George had tried to cut his wrists and neck and suffocate himself, but it didn't work.

And when the ranger asked if "he or his wife had been ill, Taylor said they were both healthy," but that he had been depressed.

And there it was.

A. Alvarez, who wrote a book about suicide called "The Savage God," noted that "When anyone dies, they leave skeletons in their closets.  When a suicide dies, he leaves his skeleton in your closet." 
And so it has now unfolded in this case: A deadly folly a deux.  Age related physical deterioration. Mental illness in the form of depression.  A couple somehow locked into a false  paradigm that becomes a fearsome trap. Choices not made.  Chances missed. Desperate derangement. No way out. The line between romantic fantasy and reality slipping away down that dark slope of misperception and temporary insanity.  A terrible act done "while the balance of the mind is disturbed."

And then, the awful consequences.  George's wife died.  He didn't.  The love of his life is gone because he was depressed and now he remains behind with the self-inflicted consequences. And friends and family are left to ask, "What did we miss?  What clues were there that we didn't see?  Could we have somehow intervened?  How did we miss this? Surely, this didn't have to happen. Surely, surely, this couldn't possibly have been what the Taylor's wanted. Not this horrorshow.

But there it is.  And that sound you hear?  That is The Savage God, snickering.  He knows well, we've been watching too many romantic movies.  Romeo and Juliet is fiction.  Real suicide is brutal, ugly, desperate, savage, messy.  It's full of fury and rage and fear and sadness.  It's also very hard to do because it's so unpredictable. Knives hurt. Guns misfire. Pills get vomited up. Cars crash wrong.  Wreckage everywhere and still we live.  Yet this God's pound of agony will be exacted.  His nightmare penalties will be paid.  By everyone.  There is no good ending when the mind and spirit breaks and clouded brains mistake a fake scenario for reality.  No good ending.

In one of his books, satirist Kurt Vonnegut has a character dealing with a disaster beyond comprehension and the only solace to be offered is a pat on the shoulder and a murmured, "There, there."

Two pointless words for a pointless deed that is beyond redemption, beyond explanation, beyond expiation, and the only thing left is a simple human touch, a point of contact, a wordless pat for all our fragile fellow creatures.

There, there. 

The Dark Coda

I was heading towards Trader Joe's to buy groceries for a friend who was coming home from the rehab hospital with a busted knee-cap, listening to the radio, when Bill Benica read the snippet of the news that a George Taylor had been arrested.  I rather dumbly thought, "Hmm, that's odd.  Must be another guy named George Taylor in the county," until Bill also noted that Gewynn Taylor, his wife, had been found dead out at Montana de Oro and George had been arrested and taken to jail. 

At that, my only response was a stunned, blank, "Whaaattt?"

I had known the Taylors almost from the first day I moved here in 1984 and, like all Los Ososians, got involved in the many Sewer Wars.  Right in the midst of almost anything having to do with Los Osos and/or any and all water, land, open space, good governance issues large and and small, there were the Taylors. They became a fixture at CSD meetings and BOS meetings, as well as being involved in many local community projects.  To some they were "community activists," to others, "gadflies." Either way, they were fierce "Civic Warriors," a constant presence in public matters, a pair of citizens who were always present and involved and speaking out for years and  years.

And, like all of us, while they were not getting any younger, they were still out and about.  Indeed, I remember seeing them at the Christmas Vocal Arts performance only a week ago.  While George was looking very frail (at 86, to be expected), both of them were smiling and looked like they were enjoying the evening. 

And now Gewynn is dead and George is in jail, engulfed in a world of unimaginable pain, a nightmare of horror that I would never wish on anyone, accused of some sort of murder/suicide pact.  The police are investigating, the neighbor's are puzzled, the community is filled with shock and speculation, and friends and family are stunned and confused and left to untangle this mystery.

And of this mystery, I can tell you that when the investigation is completed and a more comprehensive narrative unfolds, when this sad drama finally plays out, with no possible good ending in sight, when all will be said and done, those friends and family will be left with a permanent sorrow because, ultimately, there will be no good explanations.  There will be understanding, perhaps, there may even be forgiveness and peace, but there will never be any real answers to a mystery that goes to the dark, irrational tangle of the human heart.