I obviously couldn’t stop and take a picture where they wouldn’t have been thrilled with but earlier today there were about six West Whiteland police cars on Burke Road on the side of the road where it’s like a little trail and stuff?
I had just turned off of S. Whitford Rd. onto Burke and I saw lights. I slowed down because I thought oh boy another tree had fallen because there are big trees that go smoosh across the road there from time to time.
But there were literally a bunch of police cars. I don’t know if all of them were West Whiteland or if some were other agencies?
I don’t think whatever happened was good and it wasn’t a car accident. It was something in the woods.
And I remember one or two of the officers looked up at me as I was driving by and their faces were quite somber.
I was told by some people that a couple was walking on a trail and came upon a person who had ended their own life. I don’t know who or why or the age, somebody said they thought they were on the young side, which is so sad.
It just shows you once again what a mental health crisis exists in this country. And in this area, if you could get an appointment, there are therapists, but there’s not really the inpatient availability that used to exist even on a temporary basis.
Someone else came through there after I had gone through and there was a coroner’s vehicle added to the assortment of law-enforcement.
Say a prayer for whoever that was and their family.
And I will tell you another little story that I remembered with astounding clarity after so many years yesterday.
This memory, I believe was triggered by the faces of a couple of the members of law-enforcement looking up as I went by, and it was one of those weird slow motion things where you caught the look on their faces which again was totally somber. It wasn’t the normal look. I don’t know how to explain it.
I couldn’t get the look out of my head so that is what made me look for information which was out there publicly.
Driving by made me think of my freshman year in college. I had a nightmare roommate first semester freshman year, but there was no room in our suite for me to go into another bedroom so the RA’s found a single room that had opened up in an upper class person suite on the first floor of the same dorm. Obviously I took it because that was like dorm gold: a single room in a more quiet suite.
Flash forward to right before parents’ weekend and I don’t remember when I went to sleep. It wasn’t particularly late because it was kind of a chill night since so many people‘s parents were showing up that Saturday.
And then I was woken up at some point in the middle of the night by lights coming through the blinds in my room, and I looked outside and it was somebody I knew, actually one of the first people I met freshman year because I had arrived early for field hockey. He had jumped out of his girlfriend’s window in a suite above. It was only a four story building. What I don’t remember now is if it was the third or fourth floor.
He was still alive when he fell because it really wasn’t (I guess) that high or something, so I have that whole visual forever burned in my brain of paramedics and fire and police putting this guy on a stretcher and taking him to the hospital where he was on life-support a brief time and then gone.
It’s been how many decades and I can still see it in my minds eye? Of course, the other terrible thing about that event is I found out later on at an high school class reunion that he was some kind of a cousin to one of my classmates.
And the thing about somebody thinking of killing themselves is they really aren’t thinking about the people whom they are leaving behind and how it will affect them. In a sense it’s a rather selfish act. Perhaps you think I’m harsh for saying that, but that’s how I feel.
Another thing I know I will never forget about the after shocks of this was the student run memorial service afterwards in the quad. There was that bad PA system that was somewhat portable and it was warm and I watched a lot of the people around me who never knew the kid. That was sort of a surreal experience remembered in more of a slow motion than it was because I was wondering at the time how they were mourning someone they never knew? And then I remember another weird thing they had like a portable stereo outside in the quad and somebody played Genesis “follow you, follow me.”
And here I am utterly middle-aged and when I drove past that scene yesterday I remembered it all again. And all I kept thinking was the people on that trail who found this person. Because this is something when you come upon something like this, you will never forget. Just like whoever this is, they left a family behind who will never forget.
I had some guy judging because I wrote about this and I didn’t disclose any non-public information. I have no idea who it was or how old they were, just that it happened and what made me look to find out what happened was the almost visceral reaction I had driving past the scene.
So again say prayers for the friends and family this person left behind, and think good thoughts about the people who stumbled upon this through no fault of their own, and the law-enforcement and first responders , who had to deal with it.
And to our elected officials out there, not only do we need another hospital in Chester County, but the region needs actual mental health services as well that everyone can access in times of need.
As means of a postscript, I received a note from this young man’s mother and I would like to share what she said in her comment which is public on this post and my response to her that explains why I wrote about this and what exactly what I saw and why it made me feel compelled to write.
My verbatim email:
Dear Terry,
I rarely respond to comments personally but I do believe that you deserve that. First of all I am sorry about your son.
The scene I saw contained NO body. It was just law enforcement. It was the poses and the body language of the law enforcement on the scene – no coroner’s wagon etc. just regular law enforcement. THAT is what I would have taken a photo of had I driven by as a passenger, and not as a driver.
You have to understand at that point, I had no idea what had happened. There are a lot of accidents around there and honestly when it is really windy around there I don’t even drive Burke Road because of all the trees that come down.
The body language especially their facial expressions is something I will never forget. I am not trying to upset you, I am trying to tell you WHY it struck me and I went digging through the 911 recordings and the accident as it showed up on Pulse Point.
It was a weird slow motion kind of thing that was just a blink of a moment so to speak- like when they run a slow motion scene in a movie. It’s only a few seconds, but feels longer.
When I realized later what had happened, I also realized why it struck a chord. I had seen facial expressions like that before, only the scene was more than what I saw last week. That time, it was 1982 and a 19 year old boy I knew freshman year in college. It wasn’t a person I had dated, just someone I knew from around campus, one of the literally first people I met when I first stepped foot on campus. No one knew why.
That is why I wrote about this. It is the whole not knowing if you knew the person. Young men keep it tucked away inside. Your son made me remember something I should never have forgotten. There are not enough resources for mental health and definitely not enough for young men. Heck we still live in a society where boys aren’t supposed to cry.
I don’t know if you care about my thoughts, but I wanted you to understand clearly what I saw and why I wrote.
I can’t even begin to imagine how you feel. No mother should ever go through what you are going through and I am truly sorry.
