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Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about Phoebe Prince. And Charlie.

Charlie, my college roommate, good friend, and later “best man” committed suicide in 1979. He was one of those guys who in many ways seemingly “had it all”. He was intelligent, good looking, and fun to be around. He had the brains and ability to be a doctor or a lawyer, and the humor to be a Jerry Seinfeld. But Charlie grew up with a demanding father who, when he (Charlie’s father) lay dying, left this life telling his son, “Charlie, you’re never going to make it.”

Charlie was driven all of his brief 28 years to “make it” in everything he did, whether it was academics, sports, or personal relationships. But the goals he set for himself were too high to achieve. Long after his father was gone Charlie was still trying to please him by being perfect, or at least above criticism, in virtually everything. Who can do that? Charlie couldn’t. He wound up working in a poultry processing plant in Virginia dating a divorcee simply because she had a lot of personal problems and Charlie felt duty-bound to help.

Charlie had his suicide all planned out in meticulous detail long before he did it. I know, because he kept a daily journal which later came into my possession. Almost a year to the day before his death an entry read, “I’ve got the materials and the method; now all I need is the occasion.”

It was from a lonely logging road in the Shenandoah mountains that he journaled his final entry – handwritten words that trailed off in a scrawl -- as he succumbed to the carbon monoxide deliberately piped into his car. “Life for me”, he wrote, “has alternated between shit and shit storms.”

The only thing sadder to me than suicide is the despair that must precede it. It may at times be hard, but I’ve concluded it is rarely impossible to spot the warning signs: Withdrawal. Destruction of personal, even cherished, property. Rage disproportionate to the provocation. Major mood swings. Sullen resignation. And yet in Charlie’s case I did; I missed it. It was only when the phone call came that in horrible retrospect I saw how inevitable this outcome, without intervention, had been.

In our good intentions to detect those in our midst who are despairing, may none of us be like me who, desiring with all my heart to be the friend who sticks closer than a brother, turned out instead to be….

Mistaken
-- © Rolley Haggard

There once was a fairly good kid
Who thought it was given
That if he would do the right things
His life would be heaven
He gave it his best shot
He strove to make every sacrifice
He thought he was anything in the world
But mistaken

At first all his hardships seemed like
Just common misfortunes
But soon it appeared to him he
Got more than his portion
His senior-high sweetheart
Wrote back these words on his valentine:
“If you think I care a thing about you
You’re mistaken.”

Somehow in the rage of living
He found himself married
But just like his hopes and dreams all
His children miscarried
And when his wife left him
He learned that “until death do us part”
Meant “I swear I’ll always love you unless
I’m mistaken”

They buried him on the same day
The tears for him started
A first and a final kiss for
The dearly departed
Not one of them noticed
He died long before his breathing stopped
They too, like the kid they thought they once knew
Were mistaken

I did read the Discarded Image, and in fact that was my source for that entry.
In fact, it is necessary that the orgins of longaevi be unclear to preserve the mystery.

Tolkien didn't have traditional Fair Folk. That was something of a reaction to the picture of them that came from the unfortunate assumption that Fairy Tales were for children. This assumption was in fact rather unique to his time. Victorians knew nothing about it and even the "comic" sort of fairys(like Puck in Puck of Puck's Hill) invoked the older sort and occasionally had an air of fear wonder and uncanniness that slipped through whether or not the author wished. In Puck's case, Kipling probably did want that to slip through and even if he didn't he would consider it a fortunate accident that his character carried that about him. Victorian writers were not really as quick to oversanitize as reputation makes out.

One thing I notice about Longaevi is not only are they a tamed paganism, they are today a tamed memory of paganism. Back in the day many peasants left crusts of bread for the hearth-fairy and really believed they might get their crops cursed if they didn't. In their own minds they often did live in a fantasy world and in some places still do. Like many genres, a lot of the pleasure of fantasy is dependant on it's distance.

Kind of reminds me of this:

http://www.lettersofnote.com/2009/12/yes-virginia-there-is-santa-claus.html

Interesting no?
Jason, have you read C.S. Lewis's book "The Discarded Image"? He has an interesting chapter in it titled "The Longaevi".

One of Lewis's points in that book is that the mechanistic world we "now" live in, is deader. (How's that for a brutal summary?)

Things to think about...

The reason Christians are inconsistent about fantasy is that they are kind of, you know NOT SURE where the line is. It is hard to see why that is hard to comprehend.

As for the Good Folk there are different tales of their orgins and no one thinks much about it any case.