Just Kill Yourself by Percy Kachelhoffer

But sleeping pills, carbon monoxide, jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge-those methods, more peaceful, more serene, also provide that chance, however slim, that you might open your eyes and be alive. If you really wanted to kill yourself, you could do it. The truth is, if you were totally positive that you wanted to die, if you were 100 percent certain, then there are better ways to guarantee it: shooting a bullet into your brain (not front to back, but side to side) or lying down on train tracks (not standing, but with your head resting on a rail) or jumping off something higher, with a harder landing. Mostly, I thought about jumping off that bridge because it seemed like exactly the right thing to do. It's unlikely, but it's possible-it's possible for a man, even a man aiming to kill himself, to jump off that bridge at such an angle, at such a velocity, and not be exploded by the water but embraced by it. The bridge takes the matter out of their hands, as though it's not their decision anymore: If they were meant to live, if this were all some terrible mistake, then maybe they would survive. On that bridge, they're finally part of something, this massive vanquished army, growing by the dozens every year.Īnd strangely, perhaps, many of them probably jump off that bridge because it gives them an outside chance of living. It doesn't hurt that it's such a pretty spot and it's romantic-feeling, and that maybe for the first time in their lives, the suicidal don't feel so alone there. The railing is only four feet tall the fall is only four seconds long. People jump off that particular bridge for a lot of reasons.

The water, from 220 feet-the water that's straight down, at least-looks less like water and more like air. It doesn't seem nearly that high in other ways. The middle of the Golden Gate Bridge is 220 feet above San Francisco Bay.

Published in the November 2011 issue, republished here in light of Robin Williams's apparent suicideĮd note: For those who need it, for whatever reason, you can find information on suicide prevention, including hotline numbers here, here, and here.

Just Kill Yourself by Percy Kachelhoffer