Astonishing How This Blog Has Fared

It's amazing to me that in less than three years, there have been over 13,490 visitors to this blog, from six continents and over 90 countries.

I know that many of them arrived here because of some search term, probably many because they were looking for Leif Garrett instead of my son, but it is still an amazing number of visits, and I am glad they saw at least the top of the page photos and saw that my son lived.

It's evident that some were touched, some read on, some were repeat visitors, and I am grateful for that, too.

Now that I post less frequently, I am even more surprised that people keep coming. I come back to see it myself, to check the visitor stats, to post anew. Now that I have posted the best photos of Leif, it's more of a challenge to find new ones, as I don't like to post just words with no pictures.

These photos of Leif were taken on July 26, 2006 when he was helping Peter W. put together my new office furniture. I wasn't there. I was still in Kansas, and Leif's girlfriend at the time, Donna, took the photos with her cell phone and sent them to me.

He had only moved out of this room, which had been his office/living room for a year, five months before this was taken. I wonder, now, if I hadn't needed to use that room, and his bedroom, once I moved down from Kansas, whether he would have stayed with us longer, whether it would have made a difference in his life. I doubt it, though. I think he decided to move when he did because he found the opportunity with her and grabbed it.

Peter W. told me this morning he goes to this page each day wondering whether I've posted something new, even though now I seldom do. This blog became an important focus for both of us to think about Leif and our family and deal with our grief. We have come a long, long way since his death, and we are much happier and function much better. A part of that is because we have learned to live with his death and have come to compartmentalize our sadness, to keep it at a distance most of the time. But not always. It still comes through, and, from what others tell me, always will.

We will miss so many things, but one of them is his wealth of knowledge about technology, vehicles, tools and putting things together, and the help and advice he could give on all of those. Today my sister, Lannay, said she wished that she could just call him up and ask him about her problems with her computer and cell phone. I wish so, too! There are so many times I have the same wish. I don't think Leif knew how many people respected his abilities and counted on them.

Leif and a Gecko on his Hand - Tampa - October 7, 2007

Leif took this photo just about two years ago, on October 7, 2007. He's wearing his motorcycle glove and a cute little lizard is just sitting there on it, a very unusual circumstance, since these little guys are extremely fast and also can jump amazingly far and fast. I don't know whether he caught it or it jumped onto him, but he managed to get out his iPhone and take a photo of it.

Leif always liked reptiles, particularly snakes and lizards. He was fascinated with them and with cats in particular. He had pet snakes but I don't think he ever had a pet lizard, though he would have liked to own an iguana.

He had a lot of compassion for animals, and maintained that he had more compassion for them than for people, since he felt people were often cruel and destructive. However, he was far more compassionate about people than he allowed to show in his bravado persona.

This was taken the day after we returned from our three-week trip to China. He had picked us up at the airport and taken us home. It was then that we found out about the sad end to his life with Donna, and although he feigned bravado about that, too, it was clearly hard for him to come to terms with that, as he sank into depression that fall and a month after this photo was taken is when he sent me the email saying that he felt he had no purpose in life and that it held far more pain and misery for him than it did happiness or meaning.

And yet, he was interested enough to photograph a gecko, and rescue a turtle from traffic just days before he died in the spring.

Leif and USF - Fall 2007

All of Leif's adult life he was in financial difficulty, sometimes due to circumstances beyond his control, but often due to his spending on many things he couldn't really afford, from fancy cell phones to computers, from motorcycles to guns, or even a car that got poor mileage resulting in high gas bills. When he got money, such as a tax refund, he either had to pay bills he was behind on, or he would spend it on new gadgets. He seemed incapable of saving money.

The summer of 2007 when he broke up with Donna, he was in worse difficulty because he no longer had her contributing to the household income and he wanted a way to supplement his Humana salary. He decided that the best way to do that was to go back to school and use his remaining GI Bill benefits. I thought this a constructive and creative way to do it, but I was also concerned that he would spend the money, not save any, and get used to the extra income and have even greater difficulties when it ran out. My fears proved to be true.

Leif got admitted to USF for the fall 2007 semester, which started while he was still healing from his motorcycle accident on July 12th and his operation on July 27th. He determined to major in philosophy, a subject he had very much enjoyed as a student at KSU, and enrolled in two courses. He had to enroll in classes that met in the morning, because at the time he was working the afternoon-evening shift at Humana until 11:00 p.m. He felt he would be able to study some during the evening because while they were mandated to be open for calls, few came in during the later hours. He found this to be generally true.

He seemed to be enjoying being on campus and in his classes, and would send me text messages about them during the evening sometimes. One of the classes apparently had a profound impact on him, or at least his thinking about the subject matter did, as he sent his final paper to me and some others and it was the thing he left on his computer the night he died.

Leif was always a procrastinator and enrolling in school was no exception. I well remember that I was chatting (through Yahoo Instant Messenger) with him late one evening in January and asked him what classes he was taking second semester. He said he hadn't enrolled yet. I told him that he'd better get it done or he wouldn't even find any open classes during the hours he could attend. So, he got online right then and found out the deadline was midnight that night . . . about 15 minutes away. He chose two classes he thought would be interesting and that seemed to him to fulfill degree requirements. One feature of the GI Bill is that students must be enrolled in classes that lead to a degree.

He hadn't had an advising appointment and thought he knew what classes would be acceptable. He hadn't had one the fall semester, either, after convincing his adviser in email that after being a student at KSU he knew what to do.

He paid his tuition and got his books, and took classes for a month and then was shocked to get a notice that the classes he was taking were NOT approved for his degree program. He didn't tell us about this until after it occurred or we might have been able to help him fight the decision, since Peter W. had had a similar experience when he was taking classes at KSU and using his GI BIll benefits and had appealed the decision and won. However, Leif didn't get anywhere with the officials at USF and got mad and discouraged and withdrew from school, losing his tuition. His last GI Bill benefit was paid, I believe, on March 1st, although it's possible it was on February 1st.

If this wasn't the last straw for Leif, it was certainly close to it. He had been managing with the extra money during the fall semester, but also spending whatever he didn't need. Again, no savings. So, when they pulled the rug out from under him and he lost the monthly stipend, he had no savings to see him through and pay his bills. By that time, he had run up large credit card debts, too, which we didn't know about. He had paid his previous ones off and had no outstanding credit card debt when he moved out of our house in February 2006. In just two years he had amassed $12,000 of credit card debt, added to his car loan, and his longstanding previous debts to us for bailing him out twice before and buying the car he wrecked. He tried applying for personal loans but he didn't get them because of his terrible credit to debt ratio. He received the loan rejection letters just days before he killed himself, as they were dated March 23. He could have come to us, but that would have been a bitter pill to swallow, both because of his pride and because he knew we would be very dismayed at what he had done. He had not admitted to us that he had run up such debts, even when we had asked him how he was doing financially and whether he needed help.

I often wonder if just one thing had gone right for Leif if he would still be here; if he had continued to get the GI Bill; if he had gotten one of the promotions he was interviewed for; if he had found the right woman; if he had been able to control his spending; if he had seen an advisor about what classes to take.

We will never know, but we do know that the sudden withdrawal of the GI Bill stipend probably had a big impact on his decision to end his life. It may not have been the precipitating factor in the wee hours of April 9, 2008, but it was one of the factors that set it in motion. How sad that his quest for money and intellectual stimulation ended that way.
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The photo is of Leif's USF ID card, fall 2007.

Leif's Twenty-Fourth and Last Home - Tampa, Florida - June 2007 - April 10, 2008

In June 2008, Leif followed through on his decision to move from the two-bedroom apartment on Del Prado to a one bedroom in the same apartment complex, on Bonita Vista Way. He said it would save him $200 a month. He also cut out cable television (may have done that even earlier) in another attempt to lower his expenses. He was struggling financially and was also trying to make it possible to pay his expenses on his own, as he had decided that although he wanted to remain friends with her, his romance with Donna was not healthy or wise for the two of them. He told me they reinforced each others bad qualities.

I had been concerned about them and thought it was for the best for both of them, and hoped that he would begin a new chapter of his life. He did, but it was not a happy one. Initially, Donna was still living with him and he said I should treat them like good friends who were roommates, but he started dating again and she was hurt and moved out. It wasn't for long, because on July 12, 2007, two years ago today, Leif had a motorcycle accident on his way back to work from a late lunch. He had a badly broken collarbone, scraped up hands and head, and was bruised up. Luckily it wasn't worse. He was released from the emergency room late that night. Donna volunteered to come back to his apartment to help take care of him and he accepted rather than come to stay with us. I thought that was a mistake but neither of them would listen to me. Things did not go well for long and on September 16, 2007, it was over.

He had surgery on July 27, 2007 to repair the collarbone, but was in a lot of pain. I begged him not to ride again, and we had a long text message discussion about it, but he ultimately got his bike back, which hardly had a scratch on it and started riding again.

He decided to try to help out his financial problems by using his GI Bill benefits and going back to school, so while he was laid up for a month and couldn't work (and luckily had short-term disability insurance through his work to support him) he applied to and was admitted to the University of South Florida, which wasn't far from where he lived. He enrolled in the fall semester of 2007 as a philosophy student, taking two evening courses.

I thought he was depressed, but he denied it. I sent him some online tests for depression that fall, but he insisted he passed them with flying colors. Of course, as smart as he was, and having been a psychology student, he knew what answers to give or not give. I think, though, that it was only partly trying to fool me. i think he was also fooling himself.

He began to spend money that fall in large sums, money he claimed he had from his insurance from the accident. When I questioned how he could afford what he was doing, he said it was "wheeling and dealing" and that he had sold some of his belongings, a computer, a gun, a monitor, maybe more but those are the things I remember him talking about.

The thing was, he didn't have all of the medical bills come in for months, and when they did, they piled up on him. Even with two types of health insurance, he still had large amounts of deductibles he was responsible for. But, typical of Leif, he did not volunteer this information to us. He undoubtedly didn't want us to know he was in over his head again, and as usual, thought he could solve his problems himself. Selling things was one way to do it. In addition to the things he sold others, he also sold a computer to us and one to his grandmother.

The closest he ever came to really admitting he was depressed was in November, when he sent that email to me that he was struggling to find meaning and purpose, and that he needed to be needed by someone.

I think things might have limped along and he might have been able to get through the financial crisis if he hadn't waited until the last minute (literally) to sign up for his spring 2008 semester classes at USF. He hadn't gotten an advising appointment, thinking that since he had already been through four years of college and knew how to pick degree requirements, he didn't need help. Leif was always doing things at the last minute. I'm not even sure he would have gotten enrolled for the spring semester if I hadn't asked him what he was taking. When he told me he didn't know, I was razzing him about it and he decided to sign on that night and check. That's when he found out he had barely a half hour, or something like that, to enroll. He chose two classes that he thought were sufficient.

He had attended about six weeks of classes and already paid his tuition and was past the point where he could withdraw and get it back when he got a notice that the GI Bill stipend was going to be discontinued because according to someone at USF the classes he enrolled in did not fulfill degree requirements. He was livid and quit school. He said they would not approve the classes, but he didn't try to appeal the decision. By the time he told us about it, he had already withdrawn from school. He didn't want to continue without the monthly support. His dad had a similar problem when he was using his GI Bill at KSU but he appealed the decision to a higher office and they sided with him. Peter W. told Leif that's what he should have done, but since Leif had already withdrawn, it was too late, and he was too upset and angry to care, or so he said.

However, that was the beginning of the end, I think. This was around the first of March 2008. He had to try to come up with an alternate plan to pay his bills, but he still didn't tell us how desperate he was, or even admit that he needed a lot of money. He would talk about being broke until payday and when I asked him how bad off he was he would say he was "broke but not broke-broke."

Sometime in March he decided to apply for personal loans. Every time in his past that he got into financial difficulties, he had either figured out a way to weather them or we had come to his rescue. I don't think he realized that he had gotten so far in debt that he couldn't get a loan. After all, he had gotten loans for cars and motorcycles before. However, he was turned down for the loans. The rejections letters were dated March 22, and we found them on his desk after he died.

The last time we saw him was March 23, 2008, which was Easter Sunday. I asked him to come to dinner and he said he couldn't afford the gas money. I told him I would give him gas money, and he came. We had a really wonderful visit and evening together. He probably still had some hope then, because he hadn't gotten the loan rejections yet, and had met a woman he had virtually fallen in love with at first sight. He sounded happy and hopeful, and we were so glad for him. We had no idea what his situation really was, and I don't think he did, either. If we had, I would certainly have given him far more than the $15 I gave him for gasoline!

Two and a half weeks later, he was dead, in this apartment, on April 9, 2008. This was the last place he lived.

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The photos are:
1. Leif took this photo of himself with his iPhone on March 7, 2008, almost exactly a month before he died.
2. The building where Leif lived his last ten months of life, on Bonita Vista Way in Tampa.
3. Part of Leif's living room, taken by him with his cell phone, on July 25, 2007.
4. Leif's computer desk, taken by him on November 2, 2007.

Leif was not a good housekeeper. His apartments were usually a cluttered mess. There were a few parts he kept relatively neat. this end of his living room was one, but what you can't see in front of that were the boxes of stuff heaped on the floor, clothing and towels strewn on the couch and floor, the clothes on the floor in the bedroom by the unmade bed, and the cluttered up kitchen. About the only place that he consistently kept pretty neat and nice was his computer desk. He liked to have more than one monitor because he was both an avid online gamer and a multitasker. He liked to have more than one thing going on at a time on different monitors. By the time he died, he had sold some of this equipment.

This was a fairly nice apartment, but one thing about it that I don't think was good for a man who was depressed was that it was dark. It lacked the bright light that might have been better for him. That was made worse by his work schedule which had him working late nights, so that he came home in the dark, stayed up late online, and then slept late with his bedroom window covered up so the sun couldn't shine in a wake him. He spent most of his time indoors in dimly lighted places at home or indoors at work in a call center away from natural light. I don't pretend that more natural and brilliant light would have saved his life, but it would certainly have helped his moods.

Leif's Twenty-Third Home - Tampa, Florida - October 2006 to June 2007

When Leif and Donna first moved from the apartment on East Sligh to the two bedroom apartment on Del Prado in a different apartment complex, they were ecstatic. They had far more space and it was a nicer place. Leif also was smart to get a second floor apartment, which was harder to burglarize. They lived in the apartment on the right side on the second floor of this building.

With the insurance money he got from the burglary, he purchased some new furniture, including a dinette set, which they had never had before, and replacement computers, but he also replaced his guns. We had tried to talk him into saving some of the money for emergency expenses, but he claimed that he had bills to pay and needed to replace his guns. I knew that Leif loved firearms and would buy some, and he felt he needed some for protection, but he certainly didn't need all he bought. It was one of many financial mistakes he made.

At first, he seemed happier there, but things started to go wrong all to soon. He had to switch jobs due to the restructuring of the pay plan at Alltel as he felt he couldn't live on the new wage scale, and Donna lost jobs, so they were without her income. Their relationship was getting rockier, too. You can see in the photos that he was becoming depressed and gaining weight. The earlier photos are the lower two, taken January 7, 2007. The top photo was taken just four months later. By May, he was having a lot of financial difficulties and although he didn't tell me that, I got the feeling that he was pulling away from his relationship with Donna. He decided to downsize by moving into a one bedroom apartment in the same apartment complex.

Aside from the job, financial and personal problems he was experiencing, he was hit with another theft, a big one. In May, his prize Suzuki motorcycle was stolen right out of the parking lot in front of his apartment. He bucked up and put on a a stoic front as usual, but he seemed down and laconic. He again got his insurance money and purchased the used Honda touring cycle, so at least he didn't have to take on another loan and he still had a cycle to ride.
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The photos are:
1. Leif May 13, 2007
2. Leif January 7, 2007
3. Leif January 7, 2007
4. Riverview apartment building on Del Prado where Leif lived in apartment 201.

Leif's Twenty-First Home - Sun City Center, Florida - March 2005 to February 2006

In March 2005 we moved part of our household goods and all of Leif's, including his Yamaha motorcycle, to the house we had purchased in Florida. Since I wasn't going to be able to move there permanently with the rest of our things until September 2006, we had two extra bedrooms he could use and live with his dad while looking for a job and a place to live. He set up one room as an office/entertainment area with his computer, stereo system, television and a love seat, and the other as his bedroom. He spent a lot of time in his office area online, looking for jobs, playing online games, and searching for women to meet and date. Peter W. appreciated having someone there for company, at least part of the time.

Leif found a job working for Amscot, a financial services company that makes payday loans and offers free money orders. He had hopes of moving up in the company and was promoted to assistant manager at one of their storefront locations, but a fellow employee had it in for him and he ended up leaving the company and going to work for Alltel in their Tampa call center. Since Alltel had purchased Western Wireless, the cell phone company he had worked for in Manhattan, Kansas, he came on with some seniority and a little bit better wage than a new hire would have gotten, and again hoped to move up.

He still seemed depressed to me, but not as much so as he had in Manhattan. However, he still would get down in the dumps, couldn't sleep, and would take his back pack out on his cycle and get a couple of six packs of beer and sit in front of the computer drinking one after another until in the wee hours he would finally manage to drink himself to sleep in his chair.

During his time living in this home with his dad, Leif sold hjs Yamaha cycle and bought the fast yellow Suzuki you've seen photos of. That seemed to brighten him up. He knew that we disapproved of his taking on a loan for a more expensive cycle (he had paid the other one off) when he still owed us a lot of money, including the money for the Dodge Stratus we loaned him the money for when he graduated from KSU in May 2003. Despite the friction over that, he loved riding that new cycle around the Bay area at terrifying speeds, making us terrified that he would kill or maim himself or someone else that way.

He also totalled the Stratus in an accident in Tampa in December 2005 on his way to a date and then bought the silver Mazda RX-8, saddling himself with large monthly payments for two vehicles. He loved that car, too!

We had hoped he would be able to save up a nice nest egg while living here, since he had minimal expenses, but he kept spending money wildly, another symptom of depression. He could been in good financial shape, and we tried to talk to him about it and about how he was going to have to move out when I finally moved down to stay and would need money for a deposit on an apartment and money for more furnishings, but he insisted it would be "no problem." After he died, I found an email he wrote to someone else that said he had saved up a thousand dollars before he moved out of our house. I didn't know he had managed to save up even that much, but it was a drop in the bucket compared to what he should have saved.

In January 2006, right around his 31st birthday, he met Donna and was captivated. They knew each other barely six weeks when they decided to get an apartment together in Tampa. He moved out of our house and into that apartment in February 2006, and lived barely two years longer.
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The photos above are:
1. Leif showing his grandmother, Marion S. Kundiger, her first (surprise!) cell phone, which he and I got her for Christmas, on December 25, 2005.
2. Leif in his "office" in our house in Florida, March 13, 2005, only a few days after moving in there.
3. Our home.

Leif's Military Honors Ceremony - Bay Pines National Cemetery - Video - April 29, 2008

This video of Leif's Military Honors Ceremony at Bay Pines National Cemetery in St. Petersburg, Florida, was taken by Jason Palenske, who had his camera on a tripod and let it run throughout. Unfortunately, we didn't stand far enough back to get out heads properly in the frame and some of the action takes place to the right or left of the camera scene, but you can still see the ceremony. I edited it to remove time when someone was just walking into or out of the picture, or pauses. This is a sad video. Be prepared for tears. (Posted with Jason Palenske's permission.)

April 29, 2009 - Military Honors Ceremony - Speakers

Military honors services are short. So many funerals or inurnments are scheduled that there is only a half hour allotted. The family is invited to bring photos, music to play, to get up and speak, bring a minister to speak if they like. We invited Leif's family and friends to speak at both the military service and the church service later that afternoon.

Four of us spoke at the military service, Leif's father, Nikko, Donna, and I. I don't have a photo of Donna speaking but I was able to take one out of the small video of the ceremony. I don't have the complete text of everyone's remarks, but we were all crying as we spoke. It was very hard to get through, and hard to see each other trying. I kept my remarks short, as I planned my main message for the church service, my "Farewell to My Gentle Giant."

Here is my short farewell:

Leif loved his country, was passionate about our Constitution and Bill of Rights, and took seriously his oath to defend it. Whether in or out of uniform, being a soldier was an integral part of his identity, and now it will remain so, even in death. We honor his service and his patriotism, but we mourn his death with all our hearts.

This place not only memorializes his military service, but it lies close to his beloved sea coast.

Sara Teasdale wrote the poem, "If Death is Kind." To me it seems to fit his being laid to rest in this place.

Perhaps if death is kind, and there can be returning,
We will come back to earth some fragrant night,
And take these lanes to find the sea, and bending
Breathe the same honeysuckle, low and white.

We will come down at night to these resounding beaches
And the long gentle thunder of the sea,
Here for a single hour in the wide starlight
We shall be happy, for the dead are free.
~Sara Teasdale

I would like to think that Leif is free. I don't know whether anything remains after death but our memories, and those, I treasure. His 33 years were not long enough, but perhaps they were too long for him.

Leif loved the sea ever since he sailed the Caribbean when he was 16, and this is his favorite poem, Sea Fever by John Masefield.

I must down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea's face, and a grey dawn breaking.

I must down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

I must down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull's way and the whale's way where the wind's like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over.

Sweet dreams, my son.

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Leif's father read some poignant poems and expressed his love and grief.

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Donna wrote and read this:

Leif Garretson
Named after a viking need i say more. :)
He was strong,funny brilliant and kind.
Stubborn as a bull.
A true friend.
He held a fire for life and was passionate in love.
He fought for what he belived in even if it was something small.
A Knight. A soldier.
He would help you when you needed a good swift kick and teach you what you wanted to learn.
He held his friends close to his heart.
When he loved it was unconditional.
This man has warmed all of our hearts and changed all of our lives.
A powerful presence that will not be forgotten.
I love you Leif. Thank you for everything.

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Nikko read this, which she had originally posted on her MySpace page:

On 14 April at 0500 hours Central European Time, I found out from my sister in Las Vegas that I lost one of the best friends I've had in my entire life. I never thought I would lose Leif, my ex-husband and eternal confidant and friend.

We'd met when I was 18, in Manhattan, KS, through the SCA - Society for Creative Anachronism. If you go to the rememberance page his mother Jerri set up for him at www.rememberingleif.blogspot.com, and you see the picture of him when he was a Senior in H.S., then you'll see the man I met. He was charming, funny, cynical with a dark sense of humor. He was arrogant, and hansome, and knew he was handsome.

When we married on 20 October, 1995, our friends thought I'd be the one to "take the wind out of his sails", and that I'd bring him & his ego down to earth with the rest of us mortals. I did a little, but he did so much more for me. He taught me how to laugh. He showed me that life wasn't as serious as I believed. He encouraged me, a H.S. drop-out, with the help of his wonderful mother, to get my G.E.D. He always believed in me, and even, over the years, when we were at the darkest hours of our marriage, we still loved each other.

Our marriage lasted only 7 legal years, but we ended it to save our friendship. We left behind the status of "man & wife" to retain our status of "long-time friend". He taught me how to see the big picture, and gave me a step towards becoming wise.

When I joined the Army in March 2003, I could feel his pride in me. He'd been Infantry, himself, and loved the Army and his Country the same way I do. I'll never forget the last time I saw him in December 2003 after Basic Training & AIT. It was the last time I got to hug him, to sit across from him and joke and drink and enjoy his physical company. The last moment I saw him, he was on his front porch, saying goodbye, and as I got into my car, he saluted me. I never felt prouder for what I had accomplished, and for what the future was going to bring. And I'd never had greater joy in my heart than I did when he showed me he felt the same. He continued to show me that support and pride through my career, and as I got promoted to Sergeant E-5, one rank higher than he'd retired out of the Army as. As life carried on over the years, we kept in touch over the phone, email & chat. He continued to share his humor, wisdom, and love with me and mine.

He never stopped being big brother to my 3 younger sisters, son to my mother, and confidant to me and our friends.

The world has lost someone truly great, in heart, soul and spirit.

The world has lost a Patriot, someone who couldn't possibly love his Country more.

The world has lost a lover of life, beauty, justice and everything the world had to offer.

Alex, I have a hole in my heart and life that will never be filled, no matter how hard I try with tears and memories.

I'm going to miss you for the rest of my life.

Love, your ex-wife and eternal friend. See you in the Summerland.

Leif's Last Day Alive - April 8, 2008

It's so terribly hard to believe that this is the first anniversary of the last day Leif was alive and that what we know of that day makes it so hard to understand how he could have been planning suicide. If he was, he gave no one any indication of it.

It was a Tuesday, his day off. It's hard to reconstruct the part of the day before evening when he was with his friend Michael, and Jaime. I didn't have any contact with him except for two emails in the evening which were part of a group discussion. The only way to try to figure out what he did in the last three days of his life is from his email, text messages and bank statement. Unfortunately, the debits don't always post on the day they were spent, so although several things posted on April 8th, they may not have happened then. For instance, the Neverwinter Nights game he purchased on Sunday, April 6th showed up on his bank statement on Tuesday, April 8th. It seems that several purchases showed up two days later. Originally, we thought he purchased an expensive pair of shoes on the 8th but it might have been on the same trip to the mall when he went to the Apple store on the 6th. We found the shoe box but not the shoes in his apartment, so he must have been wearing them when he died.

He played Dungeons and Dragons with Donna and friends on Sunday, April 6th and was invited to do so again the following Sunday.

His tax refund was deposited in his bank account on April 3rd and he paid his rent for the month of April, and it debited on April 7th.

He filled up his car's gas tank, with the debit hitting his bank account on April 10th, after he was already dead.

During those days he spent money on food and alcohol, too.

But what we do know about April 8th for sure is that he purchased a 45 caliber Springfield XD X-Ray Delta pistol and ammunition with his debit card. According to Donna, it was not a spur-of-the-moment purchase, but one he had ordered and been waiting for for months. He was very glad to finally get it. A gun purchase was not unusual for Leif. He had purchased and sold many guns over the years and still had several in his possession.

That evening he sent two email messages as part of an ongoing discussion among Peter A., Dave, Darren and me ranging over topics as disparate as the "ultimate watch" and customer service. These last two messages were in response to an email by Peter A. about a YouTube video of "Das Omen").

Leif wrote at 7:38 p.m., "I just want to know WHO did the music. Sound kinda like Rammstein but more techno, less metal. Either way I want it."

At 8:19 p.m. he wrote, "Found  it. It is a German group called 'E Nomine.'  Here are some of their  videos on YouYube. Hard to find the music.  iTunes does not have it. I just put in a request for iTunes to get it. Amazon does but it's about $35  an album." (He sent the YouTube and Amazon.com links.)

That was the last thing I ever heard from him. He was part of the discussion and then he just dropped out. It didn't sound as though he wasn't planning on being around if he was asking iTunes to get music he wanted. The music was very dark and occult with lyrics in German that translated as, "You are the power, the everlasting prophecy, you are the Omen!" "Open the gates to the dark regions . . . " I sent him that translation in email in between his two posts. That music fit in well with what he liked at the time.

The reason he dropped out of the discussion was that his friend Michael arrived after picking up Jaime at the airport and they wanted to go over to the Tally Ho Pub across the street for beer. They were there for a few hours before they went back to Leif's apartment. Leif had all of his guns out of the safe and they were examining them. Michael said Leif was very proud of his new Springfield pistol. The guns were unloaded, but when Jaime pointed a gun in a manner Leif felt was unsafe, Michael says Leif lectured him on gun safety. Jaime protested that the gun was unloaded, but Leif said that he should always consider a gun in his house to be loaded and treat it safely.

Since Michael had a long drive home and they had to get on the road, he said he and Jaime stopped drinking but Leif continued to drink rum and Coke. Leif was a big man used to drinking a lot and he could hold a lot of alcohol without showing evidence of being drunk.

Michael and Jaime left in the wee hours of the morning, somewhere around 2 or 3 a.m. on Wednesday, April 9th. Leif was mobile and lucid, able to walk and talk, and seemed all right when they left. That is the last time anyone saw Leif alive as far as we know.
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The pensive photo with this post is one of a series of self-portraits Leif took on April 26, 2003 when he was living in the 710 N. 9th Street house in Manhattan, Kansas. They were taken in that house. He was 28 years old.

And yet - Leif was brave, strong and proud; resilient, stoic and honorable

After all I've written about Leif's unhappiness in his adult life, which hasn't really delved into some of the worst of it, the hard and cutting details, what remains is his bravery and resilience. He must have wondered why his life was so unlucky, which just once something didn't go right for him.

Yet he did experience love, even if he didn't get to keep it. He did have jobs, earn money and respect, though not up to his expectations, desires or capabilities. He did have things he loved; his cycles, his cars, his computers. He loved science fiction, computer games, movies. But at some point, those are not enough.

He drank too much to drown his pain, to help him sleep, to calm the demons.

But he was brave and resilient. How many of you could have endured what he endured, for a long as he did, keeping that cover of male bravado, that he was fine, he could take it? Could any of us keep getting up and going to work each day? He did.

How many times could we climb out of depression and try again?

How many of us could take it?

It was his resilience and bravado that gave me hope he would get through and find his place in life. It was the fact that he was in love again that gave me joy that maybe his life was turning around. It was his animated conversation the last two times we saw him that made me believe he was heading for better times. And perhaps he thought so, too. But what changed in a day?

I found a letter Leif wrote (email) that reveals some of what he went through alone at Fort Drum, and if you read my posts the last few days, you can see how this ties in to his bravado, his belief that he was beyond being hurt, beyond the demons . . . but how much could he take?

"You also say I have no idea what you are feeling. That I don't know what it feels like to be lost or hurt. BULLSHIT!!!!  I know exactly how it feels and I know how much it sucks. I was stuck in frigid New York. My Wife had just left me alone. My best friend just got out of the army and went home. I was completely alone. I had a #*%&^($ boss. Take  X and Y on their worst days; then make that everyday. Then give them to power to order you to do push-ups or any other sadistic cruel excercise till you puke and then keep going, and make it a federal crime for you to disobey them.  Yeah, I have no idea what  pain is. Imagine having a daily Asthma attack every morning while being forced to run 4 miles on shin splints so bad that you have tears streaming  down your face.  Then spend the rest of the day geting yelled at and told you are a piece of shit no matter how well you do the rest of your job because you couldn't keep up on the run this morning and the asthma is all in your head and you are just a lazy shitbag that doesn't want to run. Have medals you earned taken away from you because your (*^$) squad leader doesn't think you deserve them because despite being better at your job than anyone in the division you can't run very fast.  You are just lazy and the Asthma is all in your head, after all. Then you finally get a doctor to say you are f--- up and you still are a piece of shit because you are on a medical profile and now you are not out running with the rest of them, so you are still a piece of shit. So you come home every night and get drunk to kill the pain and get up the next day and do it again.  You use your night and weekend minutes to call back to Kansas to cry on the shoulder of an ex girlfreind who is the only kind voice you can reach because you are all alone in a foreign state and everyone here hates you and thinks you are worthless. You make detailed plans about how exactly you are going to kill yourself to the point of making sure that if you botch the job and the shotgun does not kill you instantly that you are far away from help and you will surely bleed to death before being found. You pick out a spot and map it with your GPS planning to leave the coordinates of where your body can be found miles in the wilderness where no one could stop you or save you in your suicide note. And finally the ONLY  reason you don't go though with it is because you know how much it would hurt your mother for her son to die and no matter how much pain you feel you can't do that to her. And so you push on day after day just looking for the light at the end of the tunnel.  There was a point where I decided it was over. I was not going to hurt anymore. I was not going to let anyone hurt me. I stopped running from my problems and faced them. After all, what have I got to lose? I was ready to die. What can they do to hurt me when I don't care about living? I let the hate roll off of me like it wasn't there. I stopped running from bills and responsibilities and I charged at them. I was going to win or they were going to destroy me.  But the fear was gone and most of the pain. I still struggled, but damn, I just survived being suicidal. I decided never to be that way again. And yes, it really is that simple. You just decide one day that you are tired of feeling that way, and when you do and you let go of whatever was hurting you, then you start over. I let go of Nikko, I let go of my own doubts. I just decided to do the best I can and let the chips fall, but I decided to do my BEST! Not to run and hide. You see, it's very empowering to survive suicide. You truly become fearless. I mean, what's left to fear when you have been at a point that you no longer feared death and wanted to die?"

He wrote this in March 2007, six years after the came back from Fort Drum and one year before he died. It wasn't as simple to just put it all behind him as he says, and I don't think he ever really let go of Nikko, either. He was a very depressed man when he came back from the army, for a long time, and he was depressed again after J. left him, and again when his relationship with Donna ended, but he survived. Think of the bravery and determination it took to go on, to keep trudging forward when the light at the end of the tunnel keeps going out.

But why, a year after he wrote this, did the darkness overwhelm him? Or did it? What really happened in the wee hours of the morning of April 9, 2008?
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The photo above was taken at our home on Leif's last birthday, January 2008, while he was talking on his beloved iPhone and playing with a laptop.

Leif and Love

It's impossible to understand Leif without knowing of his quest for love. I've already written of that, and posted his thoughts on dating, but I haven't written about the women he loved. Leif wanted to be in love. He was a romantic man who wanted the companionship and friendship of a soulmate and was actively searching for one beginning in high school.

His first love was a beautiful young woman in Puerto Rico. She went to a different school and her mother worked in the office with Leif's Dad. He only went out with K. a couple of times but he was head over heels in love with her and carried a torch for her long after we moved away from Puerto Rico back to Kansas. He never had a girlfriend during his senior year at Manhattan High School there, though he dated quite a few young women.

At a Society for Creative Anachronism event (Lilies War), which I think was in June 1994, he met Nikko, and married her a few months before his 21st birthday. I've already written about their marriage and divorce, and subsequent friendship.

After he climbed out of his depression when he came back from the army and losing Nikko, he again began dating and looking for love. He had a pretty good case on L. and hoped it would develop into something, but somehow it never did.

Then, after he graduated from KSU and began working at Sykes, he met J., a young woman who looked a lot like Gillian Anderson (Scully on the X-Files) and fell deeply in love with her. J. had a toddler daughter and had been in the army. Leif took them in and was prepared to make a life together. He got a better job at Western Wireless next door and she continued at Sykes. Sykes sent her to the Philippines to train people there for a call center (effectively making their team train their offshore replacements). While she was gone, he determined that he wanted to ask her to marry him and he had every reason to believe that she would. He bought the gorgeous ring above and showed it to me, thrilled.

I wanted so badly to be happy for him, to rejoice with him, to praise his choice of rings and bride, but I was concerned; concerned that the ring was beyond his means, concerned that J. wasn't ready to settle down, concerned that he would get his heart broken again. He was walking on air, though, and I didn't want to burst his bubble. I wanted his wishes to come true.

I asked him whether he was ready to be a father and he said he was. I think he had come to love J's daughter, too. Earlier in his life, he had said he didn't want children, but by this time, I think maturing had made him think perhaps he did, and being around J's daughter had convinced him. I took care of the daughter a few times. She was a cute little girl. I have a photo I found on his computer of the three of them going to the zoo in Manhattan, Kansas. J. and her daughter spent Thanksgiving and Christmas of 2003 with our family, and I have lots of photos of that, too but I won't post photos of anyone without their permission.

The night J. got back from the Philippines, Leif proposed to her and she accepted. He was ecstatic! He posted the news and the photo of the rings on the ZAON forums. I hoped things would go well, but a week later, she gave back his ring and left town. He was left with the payments on the ring and heartbreak, but he hoped the would get back together. Ever since that day in 2004, they had contact on and, and they both said they loved each other, but they never got back together, and Leif never got over her. He loved her till the day he died, and when he died, friends immediately asked if something had happened to her. Leif knew he would never have her, went on with his life, and continued to seek for another love, but he never really let go of any of the women he loved.

When we moved to Florida, he continued to search. He dated quite a bit and found someone he cared a lot for. Some strange circumstances broke up his romance with L., oddly enough, another friend of his somehow poisoned the relationship with thoughts that he was getting back together with J., which didn't happen. Although Leif loved J., I think by that time he knew it wasn't going to be a relationship that would happen or that he could trust and he was ready to find a new love even if he couldn't get J. completely out of his mind.

Then he found Donna. He was fascinated with her frenetic, mercurial intelligence and street smarts, her cuteness and bubbly personality, and overjoyed to have found a woman who not only liked to ride motorcycles and play online computer games (like his favorite PlanetSide), but also read Douglas Adams and was a model. He moved into an apartment with her in February 2006. For a time he was in love with her, but their relationship with through numerous ups and downs and he eventually and regretfully concluded that although he cared about her that their relationship was destructive to both of them and he wanted to end it gently and still be friends. Unfortunately, it didn't end well and it ended on top of his cycle accident. He did not take it well, and by November loneliness and depression had set in. He sent this email to me:

"No things are not bright. Rather dark actually as I struggle to find purpose. People have asked why I stayed with Donna. Including Donna. The simple answer is that she gave me a reason to exist. I had a purpose when I was with her. I had skills and knowledge that could benefit her. I had a reason to exist. That is the hardest part of this whole thing. I don't miss Donna; I just miss having a purpose. A reason to keep trudging on despite the fact that each day holds far more dificulties and irritations than it holds joys or pleasures. Part of me is relieved she is gone; part of me misses having someone that cared that I was there and was better for it."

I cried when I read that email. I felt so sad for him. How could my son, who wanted so badly to love and be loved, who needed so badly to be needed, to be someone's hero, be so lost and without a purpose in life? I think it also deluded himself that he didn't miss her, just as he tried to insist he didn't miss Nikko. It was that old male bravado again. Show no weakness. It was obvious that he missed them, missed the companionship, even if he didn't miss the problems. He knew the relationships were over, knew they weren't right for him, but just the same, he was so lonely and berift. I worried terribly about him between that email and March 2008. We tried to stay in contact every day, tried to see him as often as he would allow, which was about once or twice a month. When he came for Christmas he was clearly not a happy man. When he was here for his last birthday, he was subdued and preoccupied, looked depressed. As I've written, the photo of him at his last birthday made me cry. I had to cajole him into smiling, but his eyes did not smile. He looked so sad.

He got back into the dating game with Match.com and eharmony.com and tried again. I tried to get him to look at some other possibilities, organizations, SCA, but he focused on the online world, and he found someone yet again. In March, he began corresponding with and talking on the phone with D. who lived in another city in Florida. He was thrilled to have found someone he considered not only compatible but ideal in several ways. He only had one date with her and he immediately started sending me text messages all about her, then sending photos. He was totally smitten. I was so happy for him, but worried that once again, he would find disappointment and wondered how he could survive another one.

He never saw her again. The night they were to have a second date, her mother had a heart attack, and she had to cancel. He was willing to wait, he said. She was worth it. We saw him on Easter, March 23, for the last time. He seemed so happy, so animated. He talked about her, hoped it would work out for him. We hoped so, too. She, however, had pulled away to be with her family after her mother's heart attack. While Leif understood, he felt left out and lonely again.

Somewhere in this time, he lost control of his finances. He had lost his GI Bill benefits in February when USF decided the classes he was taking didn't meet the requirements. That cut his monthly income. Then he applied for loans and didn't get them because he was maxed out on his credit cards and couldn't pay his bills. We found letters rejecting his loan applications on his desk, neatly laid out as though he wanted us to find them. Perhaps he felt he wouldn't even be able to see and date D. without any money for dates and the gas to get there. As a joke, he sent me text messages about the gas mileage his RX-8 got. I was more than a little slow on the uptake.

Leif: "Have I told you about how great my car is for the quarter mile?"
Sent on Saturday, Mar 22 2008 at 5:46:06 PM

Mom: "Didn't know you were on a racetrack. Is this happening right now or is it a fond memory? Amusing. You can't afford gas to come here but apparently can afford a much more costly potential ticket or accident or using lotsa gas.:-P love your car? Sure is pretty!"

Leif: "No its a joke... Normally that means drag racing however in my case..."

Mom: "Joke? In your case?"

Leif: "At $3.50 a gallon a tank costs $50. One tank lasts 200 miles. Therefore 4 miles per $. Or one mile per $0.25. " In other words my car is built for a quarter ($0.25) mile."

Mom: "Argh! 4 mph? That bad?"

Leif: "No four miles pet dollar not gallon."

Mom: "Oh, that kind of 'quarter mile.' Kind of a sad joke, tho. Did you come up with that? If so, otta send it to Stewart or Colbert. Ok. Little slow here."

Leif: "14 mph but a quarter a mile.:-@"

He was joking on March 22nd. He hadn't yet received the rejections on his loans. 18 days later he was dead.

On the "desktop" of his computer I found this letter to J. I don't know whether he ever sent it to her. I was written February 18, 2008, a month before he met D., and less than two months before he died:

"I must say that as I write this I am a bit intoxicated. While I am not so intoxicated as to be unable to think clearly I have learned that for individuals like myself which are prone to be overly cerebral and rational such moments are not a dilution of ourselves but rather a liberation of our souls. Forgive me if my execution is not as brilliant as I would desire but the clarity is present. If you know me at all I always seek to make sense of things, to understand and to rationalize. I seek to find order in the universe and o make sense of things. I am not sure if it's my close connection or some other factor which makes it so hard for me to reconcile my undying love for you, but I cannot deny that never in my short life have I felt even a fraction of what I felt in those brief moments which you smiled at me. I have spent years trying to forget that moment in my car where I looked at you sneezing in the sun and knew I loved you. I have spent countless hours trying to move on, to find other more rational choices. I have tried so hard to ignore what I felt for you or at least not to think about it. But it is all for naught. In 33 years I have only once known what the word love could mean. All else is facsimile. All else is make believe. Even as I go though the motions of mating with other women in a vain attempt at self glorification and distraction I am only reminded of the brief magic I knew with you. My Mind reels against this idea as My cold rational Machiavellian realism tries to reconcile your unfettered optimism. Yet I can see that this is why I love you. You are so unlike me. So countervailing in your purpose as to balance me. As a cold hard realist your optimistic idealism represents everything which is lacking in me. All the goodness which I might neglect in favor of the practical and realistic. By contrast I would ground you in your noble but often unrealistically idyllic dreams.

"I really think we are a better match than might be readily apparent. I am grounded in the dark reality of existence and long for one to give me home and inspiration. Perhaps if I may speculate you are frustrated by the difficulties of translating your idyllic visions into reality in tangible form.

"But enough analysis. I do too much of that.

"I have known few things in my life. Of the things I have known I have been able to rationalize most of them. If I tried I might be able to do so with this but I don't want to. I just know. I just know that you are the only woman I have ever loved. And Increasingly I am coming to believe that you are the only woman I will ever love.

"I have made lists, looked at criteria, analyzed to no end. But nothing changes the fact that you are still the face I picture when I think of love. All others are stand-ins. Substitutes, facsimiles.

"How I wish I could convince myself not to love you."

I think there is a lot in this letter that makes one pause. The sad truth of unrequited love, the terribly loneliness and emptiness, but I also think there is some self delusion. He loved J. deeply and with all his heart, but in a sense, he could continue to love her like that because he never had to make it work. He could always pine away for what he didn't have. He didn't have the cold realities of the relationships he'd had that didn't work out. This one ended so quickly, just five months after he met her. It was the symbol for all he wanted in life, in a woman, and never had to pass the test of reality, of living together long term. He says she was the only woman he ever loved like that, but there were others, and he had talked about them to me. He liked to convince himself with his cold rationalizations that he didn't really miss those he lost, like Nikko and D., but he did miss them, terribly. And he stayed in contact, always. He could see some things clearly, but not completely, and some he could not really see at all.

But one thing is true. Leif died of a broken and lonely heart as much as he did from anything else. In his lonely male code, he was shut up in a tower of alone-ness, seeking for one woman to release him, and he never found her. I'm not sure the woman he needed really ever existed. I'm not sure any woman could have lived up to what he needed from her. Never-the-less, I wish he had found her. How fervently I wish it.

Veteran's Day - Honor, Pride and Tears

Our family has so much to be proud of on Veteran's Day. Leif's father served our country for 24 years in the army. His brother, Peter Anthony, is in his 17th year of service in the Air Force (21st if you count his four years as a cadet at the Air Force Academy). My brother,Donovan, served in the army in the late 1960s. His son Rick served in the navy and his son Timothy served in the army. My brother-in-law DeWayne served in the army.

And Leif served as an infantry machine gunner, from January 1998 until May 2001, when he was medically boarded out of the service due to asthma that was somehow caused by his service and exacerbated by it when he was required to be out in freezing temperatures or to overexert carrying his incredibly heavy gear and gun. This was a terrible blow to him, but he was proud of his service and identified with it, considered himself a warrior, and was fiercely dedicated to his oath to uphold the United States Constitution.

Today was a day of honor, pride and tears, honor for Leif and all the military members of our family and nation, pride for their service, and tears for those who have fallen, whether in battle, because of their service, or otherwise.

Yesterday there was a piece on television about servicemembers and veterans committing suicide, and how the rate has climbed precipitously. Leif could be counted among those numbers, a medically retired, disabled veteran who never found his place in the civilian world.

Today we went to Bay Pines National Cemetery where Leif is inurned. I wore one of his dog tags, which you can see in the photo above. I knew I would break down, and I did. Peter and I both cried our hearts out for our lost son. I kept saying, "I want him back!"

I know that's impossible. I know the truth. But that's how I feel, and I'll never stop feeling that way. I miss him so!

I suppose that a grief counselor would say that I'm in the denial stage, but I would deny that. I know Leif is dead. I know he isn't coming back. I don't say it can't be so. But I also don't want to let him go.

I ran my hands over the stone, over his niche. I leaned against it and cried and cried.

Leif's friend and former girlfriend, Donna, came there today, too. She placed a single red rose for him and cried with us. Thank you, Donna, for caring and for honoring him.
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The photo of Leif at the top of this post was probably taken in 1998, before he was promoted to Specialist 4, before the problems with asthma set in.