Preface:

There is a lot of commentary and debate going on in the online world about the integrity and responsibility of work presented for consumption on web sites.  Journalistic integrity, moral integrity, social integrity and the responsibility of WebMasters in general who sometimes happen to post lies, misinformation, badly researched material presented as facts and things which some people consider too dangerous and way to easily to access. 
When I was kid I guess for contemporary purposes, I was a member of the Trench Coat Mafia, we were all cool and wore trench coats in the summer and acted dorky and played D&D.  My backpack was full of various tools, equipment and improvised weapons.   I kept a tattered copy of the Anarachist CookBook right next to a copy of my favorite Penthouse letters, which was always close to my copy of the satanic bible.  As a point of reference, if you tell kids something is bad, wrong and off limits, they will run to find a copy of it.  I got all my most dangerous reading materials from some pretty obscure and seedy places, like Waldenbooks and B Dalton. 

My friends and I made our teenage life a competition of trying to figure out who could find the most “vile”, “dangerous” and “corrupting” materials to shock the others with.  We never made too many bombs, we thought better and instead combed the toy stores for the most realistic looking pellet guns to pelt ourselves with.  We never invoked demons or any lesser minions of hell, collaborative packs with minions from even one of the lesser levels of hell never seemed wise.  Our worse sin was probably shoplifting.  Sadly, we didn’t involve ourselves in strange orgies-we tried, drunken party date rape and drunk driving.  We were all horny, angst filled teens and occupied ourselves picking on each other, finding friendship and having fun.  Drugs and sex and violence were not really a big part of our life. 

I never pondered suicide until I was probably about 19 and it was about a girl, Jada.  A mormon, went to BYU.  Nuff said.
My second serious thought on suicide was when I was about 21, it was about a girl, Erin. A cute little petite jewish version of Jada.  Nuff Said. 

Usually when I pondered suicide in my youth, it was over a girl and how my life couldn’t go on.  That was about it.  I never wrote my suicide notes, though I updated my sad little will on a regular basis, it was necessary as my relationships with people and the importance I associated with said relationships changed.  I didn’t want to kill myself and leave all my good shit to the person I was killing myself over. 

2
Jennifer’s first piece for the site was an introduction to the humor site.  I thought the introduction would be a lasting and humorous contrast to what was in some respects was a uncertain addition to the site. Later on she wrote a pretty interesting  piece about classical poetry form and writing.  Jennifer is an excellent poet and I have always enjoyed the unsettling personal nature of which most of her poetry is drawn from.  Recently while we discussed showing a selection of her work online we came across a suicide note she’d written when she was eighteen. 
The suicide note was prefaced with a sentence, which stated in no uncertain terms that it was the only suicide note of Jennifer’s, which had any literary value.  This four hundred and ninety word, thirty one line piece was classic in it’s suicidal note tendencies, threaded with heaping levels of contradictive justification for the act and it’s inevitable need for end.  The tones and overlay of feeling unappreciated were all elevated with graceful writing and egotistical self-compliments.  With most suicidal notes, the reader is a part of an audience who are supposed to experience the act of someone’s suicide and their poignant note as a lasting impact of total closure and completion in the scheme of things. 

When you’ve personally experienced and also heard the unembellished tales of someone who took their life you realize there is no need to embellish the story of someone who has actually committed suicide.  The first big thing is that people rarely leave notes.  Sadly it’s true, for most people suicide notes are the training wheels of a future dead person.  People who despair, people who decide to eat pills, to suck on carbon dioxide, blow their brains out with a gun to the mouth or to the side of a head.  These people don’t leave fucking notes….they leave a mess, that someone is left to clean up after them.    Suicide is alone, it is desperation, it is the bill you know you can’t cover.  The experience you don’t want to go through one more fucking time, desolation.  It is not something you spell check and revise.

A lot of times it starts like that though, with the training wheels, trying the thoughts on for size, pondering it more and wondering if you can pull it off.  Other times you just place the gun to your temple and feel the cold metal, sometimes you taste it.  After awhile the little coaster wheels come off and you’re wobbling under your own weight.  For the first time, in some strange way, the realization that you can end it comes to some kind of strange satisfaction and the ritual, the cleverly crafted note, the proverbial gateway joint to your eventual heroin downfall is something that comforts you in ways that others do not understand. 

So naturally when Jennifer asked me what I thought of her suicide note and if I’d post it, my comments were that I did enjoy it and that I would post it.  I  sat on that response awhile and did not post the suicide note.  I was more excited about a piece, she wrote which was more on my excitement list for KungFu.  We kept coming back to the suicide piece though and eventually I found some reservations, fear, even a sense of responsibility.  Jennifer had written such a crafty hip little note, I was worried.  Eventually we talked about it and we bantered back and forth about whether or not it was cool and just how much heat she might take for it and most importantly if someone might read it and get inspired.

If you’re not suicidal and have a good life going for you, then I’ve spent over a thousand words insulating you from something you might only find amusing or distasteful.  If you are suicidal then this could be the note that gets you on the bike and gives you enough courage/cowardice to end your life, then take heart.  In the end this isn’t new territory, hundreds of famous people have ended there lives and left inspiration for those of us with suicidal tendencies, how responsible am I if I post a hip suicide note, which might tempt one person down the road to ending there life.  KungFu is about laughing at shit that makes you want to put down the good fight.  KungFu is about getting up and kicking ass and sometimes it’s easier said then done.  

Sometimes, the best then you can do is run, but you’re supposed to come back another day,  you’re supposed to not give up.  Don’t take the abuse, don’t take the heart ache,  don’t keep fighting the same fight and losing and dying…inside or out.  KungFu is about learning to overcome… I’ve tasted metal, I’ve pondered pills and I’ve ploughed the depths of feeling bad, feeling sorry for myself and then I got sexy baby, I bought a motorcycle, drank eighteen year old scotch, smoked good cigars, ate  good sushi, had good sex.  Bought a cell phone, read books and more books and watched movies and more movies.  There is so much to live for…That’s KungFu. 

So with no further ado, I present the Immaculate Jennifer Waller’s best suicide note to date.
 
 

From 18. A little prose *S* One of my many suicide notes. This is the only one with any literary value... 

I apologize that I'm not leaving words of encouragement, but I am not encouraged. As time passes, I am inclined to emerge from my grief and rejoin the reality I worked so long to create. In the reality, death was the answer to all suffering, but now it seems that death is only a new and greater level of the same suffering. I know what it's like to want to turn your back of the life and the person nature has given you and to challenge your creator with the ultimate act of destruction of his creation. I know what its like to deny other the opportunity of knowing my true self because of the fear that this "true" self would not only frighten and disturb them, but also because it would hate itself for seeking truth. Inside, I'm afraid. It's not fear of rejection of others although this makes self-rejection painfully apparent, but fear of the rejection of who I am and acceptance of meaning nothing to myself although I may mean everything to others. This meaning lies in the personality I have allowed them to create. They perceive me this way until I too only see myself through their eyes, but because I know the untruth of my appearance all I can see when looking at myself is deception. I've lost myself. The tangled complexity of this trap envelops my mind and my consciousness until I realize that I am not longer in control of what I am. I long to reclaim that control by ending the control of others and killing this monster they have made me in order to free myself.

Jason was a genius and intellect is a cancer that eats away happiness. An intelligent person knows that true happiness lies in the absence of intelligence. Therefore, he strives to give happiness to others by keeping them ignorant and although we try to ignore it, this knowledge persists in its struggle to be recognized. When we don't know what to do with our hands, we light a cigarette and when we don't know what to do with our minds, we commit suicide. For some, genius is so persistent that suicide is inevitable. For others, the mind and it's wish to end it's struggle can be conquered by surrendering it's control to others.
For those of us with suicidal tendencies, life is nothing more than a drama we have created to please and entertain others. This drama, of course, most have the most dramatic of endings. The romanticized beauty of self-murder seems to be the only appropriate end to an existence that exists only to dazzle the audience. And so, I now continure this drama of my life, a tragedy really, some heros, some villians, all ultimately destroying ourselves by betraying ourselves in pursuit of satisfying the audience. All of us, following our leader, jumping off the bridge, and each to our own degree, committing suicide.