On suicide

When I was in high school, at a Convent in Africa, I remember an event.

I remembered it because of the three girls who committed suicide in one place, The Priory, which is all over the UK news at the moment.

We had a really nice common room at our school, a huge rondaval, in which there were comfortable sofas and chairs. The centre was clear for activities and there was a really good Radiogram. We kept up with the news. I was a senior. One night we heard the news that Marilyn Monroe had committed suicide. It seemed devastating news.

That night an event happened in the Convent, that unbeknown to us was happening all over the World. One of us tried to commit suicide.

I don’t know how it was discovered, maybe another girl ‘told’, but us seniors, were dragged out of bed in the middle of the night to the Infirmary. Our job was to walk, walk, walk and talk, talk, talk until the doctor arrived. And then again till the ambulance arrived which it eventually did. And our attempted suicide was whipped away.

We were allowed to sleep in in the morning.

I can’t remember if the girl ever came back to school, but I think she lived.

There was an epidemic of copycat suicides in young girls after the death of Marilyn Monroe.

Suicide is catchy.

Nowadays, people blasted with constant horrors of the new apocalypse culture shared via social media, will find suicide even more meaningful than the death of one actress who may or may not have committed suicide.

Suicide is catchy.

Or have we forgotten?

Nowadays, it seems that someone else must always take the blame.