Why Do All My Friends Want to Kill Themselves?
When depression is just one push notification away
We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!— “The Hollow Men” by T.S. Eliot
I often get texts at 9 a.m. that scare me. I live in London now and, depending on the time zone, that’s around 3 a.m. in the U.S.
While I soberly eat some Greek yogurt (and maybe a banana), my phone vibrates on the table.
“Michael, I want to fucking kill myself.”
It could be anyone.
My heart starts pounding in my chest. I hesitate before opening it; they’ll see I’ve read it and expect a response.
“Are you okay?” I type.
Then I delete that text, letter by letter.
“Hahaha me too dude.”
I press send.
I take a bite of yogurt.
One day, I’ll send that message to a corpse.
I’m not naive enough to think that my generation is the first to experience depression. T.S. Eliot wrote his poem “The Hollow Men” a hundred years ago. A hundred years before that…
