In My Head...
I read this the the other day on the Florida Today site, and it and it really struck me with how sad, yet somehow beautiful it was. Over the past couple days it has really stayed with me. I've been playing some of the scenes in the story over and over agian in my head, and I can see them, almost like I was there, or at least my version of what I think it might have been like. I'm going to try to write a short story, and then maybe turn it into a short film (5-6 minutes) based off of the story. It might be the only way I can get it out of my head...
Surfer saw no reason for living
Suicide victim had back pain, money troubles
JUAN ORTEGA
FLORIDA TODAY
COCOA BEACH - After her son’s public suicide near crowded Cocoa Beach Pier a day earlier, Stephanie Rose and friends crisscrossed Brevard County all day Tuesday, gathering what her son left behind.
At the morgue, they viewed the body of Joshua O’Barr, 23, of Orlando.
Elsewhere, they retrieved his surfboard and paid $100 to recover his brother’s red pickup, which O’Barr drove to the beach. Because he left his girlfriend a phone message, everyone knew to visit a restaurant where he had scribbled on a wall that he loved her.
“He didn’t see any reason to live,” Rose said, as tears fell for O’Barr, her older son.
O’Barr valued his friends and spent plenty of time with them. He loved being at the beach, surfing and fishing. He adored his blue, classic ’65 Ford Mustang.
But O’Barr gave up on life because he was in pain, without money and disillusioned about ever continuing his hobbies, said Rose, a 48-year-old Orlando resident.
While on his way to the beach more than two years ago, a hit-and-run accident on the Beachline injured his back and left him in constant pain, Rose said.
It prevented O’Barr from surfing, which is why he had moved to Cocoa Beach from Orlando. So he returned to Orlando.
He underwent back surgery earlier this year. In his absence from work, he was asked to resign his salesman job with a furniture store. He soon faced an eviction from his apartment and couldn’t afford his medication, Rose said.
“I was distraught for a long time,” Rose said. “We thought the operation could help him, but it made him worse.”
On Monday, O’Barr drove from his Orlando residence to the Cocoa Beach Pier. Carrying a white plastic bag, he mounted his tan and red-stripe surfboard, police said.
He paddled out in the water just south of the pier. Sitting atop his board about 100 yards from shore, he pulled out a firearm and shot himself in the presence of about 200 beachgoers, police said.
Orange County sheriff’s deputies found Rose on Monday night at her Orlando home. “As soon as I saw them, I knew,” Rose said.
O’Barr didn’t seem sad to his girlfriend, Nicole Willoughby of Orlando. “He always took care of everybody,” she said.
However, O’Barr gave discreet farewells to those he knew, phoning friends and family and telling them how much they meant to him, Rose said.
The same day he ended his life, he scribbled a note to his girlfriend on a green wall inside Da Kine Diego’s, a favorite restaurant of his in Satellite Beach.
In black marker, the message read, “Josh loves Nicole. 7/10/06.”
His girlfriend, accompanied by O’Barr’s family and friends, visited the restaurant Tuesday and wrote back.
“Josh, we all love you so much and we’ll always hold on to your memories. I’ll meet you again and then we’ll get married. I love you so much, baby. 7/11/06.”