Falling

A year ago today, a coworker and I were getting breakfast on the 30th floor of our building when a woman flew by the building next to ours, the Civic Opera House. It would seem she jumped from the 40th floor and landed on the canopy, two stories above the ground. The entire room rushed to the window and the first word out of anyone's mouth was "I hope that wasn't an April Fool's prank."

People spent the rest of the day watching the crews clean up after her and bemoaning the briefness of life. Life is especially short when one decides to jump out of a window, a decision that is rarely reversible.

I try not to be one to claim to know what is best for other people individually, though I spend plenty of time declaring what may or may not be best for me. A year ago, a woman jumped out of a window and I watched her fall. Perhaps she was sad, or cornered, or frightened. But she identified relief in a way few of us would. And if it was relief from pain she found, I will not fault her that.

I would have kept a parachute on standby.