(no subject)
I've had a lot of anxiety since I found out that Mills took his own life this week. The funeral was one of the heaviest experiences of my life. Every picture of him was like a blow to the chest, his warm smile always soliciting the biggest hugs I could muster... I couldn't help but smile back. I crept into the back of the church and listened to a middle age preacher read a seemingly unrelated bible passage to a room full of elderly people. My mouth twisted at the travesty that was unraveling before me. I held out for a morsel of truth as a letter was read to the room, one written by his own hand, dated October 3rd 2009. The contents of that letter, I can't fully repeat to anyone. They will be burned into my memory at least for all of this life. But what I got to hear was the experience of a soldier, a friend, watching a person die at his own hand for the very first time. And the moment he realized that that person was a child, he no longer knew what kind of man he was, or what kind of choice he had. The pain was unbearable for me, but for him....
And the pastor said "I believe that god was there, I believe that god suffered with Mills."
I had to leave, 15 minutes into the funeral and I thought my lungs were going to burst.
The scenes always haunted him as the theft of his innocence will haunt me. The terror and the guilt that he carried crushes me whenever a thought passes him over. I am so, so angry for him. I am angry at the government, and at religious leaders, and everyone else who fed him through their machine and gave him pennies for his soul. I have not acknowledged anger this way for a very long time.
I hope that we both find peace quickly.