Fifteen Years Ago

Fifteen years ago we approached Leif's apartment entrance with great trepidation. We were terrified about what we might find, but it was far worse than we imagined. The day before, we received a call from his work supervisor, who called us as his emergency contacts, because Leif had not shown up for work, or called in. He had tried to contact Leif without success and said that Leif never just skipped out on work. He was concerned.

So were we! But we hoped that maybe he was depressed and hiding out, or had gone to Orlando to see the woman he was dating, or thought he had changed his work schedule, or gotten drunk and was sleeping it off. We tried repeatedly throughout the day to contact him via phone and text messages but got no response. Then I tried calling the hospitals to see if he had been admitted after an accident or something. I did not find him. I tried calling his friend Michael, who said he had been with him the night before, but hadn't heard from him that day, April 9th. He lived an hour and a half away, so he couldn't just go over the Leif's apartment to check on him. We should have. 

But, he was an adult. It seemed intrusive to burst in on him if he didn't want to talk, so we waited. We had no idea he was already dead. 

The next morning, with no contact, we decided we had to go to his apartment and see him. Peter W. was too wrought to drive, so I drove there. We discussed that if both his vehicles, his car and motorcycle, were in the parking lot, it was a bad sign....and they were. 

The apartment door was locked. Calling, knocking, nothing got an answer, so we went to the apartment complex office and asked the manager on duty to let us into his apartment because we were worried something had happened to him. To my surprise, she agreed to do so without an argument. 

We went in, looking into the first rooms, the bedroom and bathroom, and didn't see him. Then we looked in the kitchen and he was there on the floor surrounded by a large and thick pool of blood and tissue, his head and upper back against the refrigerator door, his feet under the edge of the cabinet. A gun was on the counter. At first glance, it looked to me like he had shot himself in they eye, but I quickly saw the gunshot wound in the center of his forehead. I remember the two of us saying, "No, no no!" 

Peter W. was in agony and I told him not to look. I got him out of the kitchen and called the sheriff's office. I knew we could not touch Leif, or anything in that kitchen, because there would be an investigation, when the only think I wanted to do was hold my son. I will always regret that I couldn't, and didn't. 

The detective came. She found the bullet casings. We asked her personnel to be sure all his guns had no ammo in them. He had several more. She said to get everything of value out of there or it would be stolen. We had to get help to get his car and motorcycle to our home, and we packed up the computers, guns, guitars, and anything else of value we could in a neighbor's pickup truck. He and his wife were kind enough to drop what they were doing and drive to Tampa to help us.

I called the insurance company. We drove home. I called family members. All of this sounds so dry and matter-of-fact, but our hearts were broken. There weren't enough tears to every cry it out. 

He had been dead a day, but his death certificate says "Found April 10, 2008." The autopsy says it was a suicide and I talked to the pathologist who did the autopsy and asked how he knew that. He said it was a contact wound, meaning the gun was against his head....the gun he bought the day before.

Fifteen years and I still miss him every day of my life. 

 

A Troubled New Love Relationship Begins

When his mostly phone and email romance with LA trailed off in October 2005, Leif began dating again and meeting the dates through match.com and eharmony.com. He told me that some guys asked why he was willing to shell out the membership fees and he said that it would cost more than that to hit the bars and other places trying to find companionship, and that he had found them to be terrible places to meet people.

On January 25, 2006, he got a "wink" from someone on match.com that piqued his interest. He had been an ardent fan of Douglas Adam's "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" since he was in junior high, and he met few women who had similar reading, or television, interest. Thus he was impressed when D emailed him "42," the classic answer to "life, the universe and everything." He was instantly interested in meeting her. I believe they first met on his 31st birthday, January 28, 2006. She was about to move out of Tampa with some friends and he didn't want her to go. He first began bringing her to our house, where I met her in early February. We weren't willing to have a friend of his (any friend) move in, though, I don't know whether it was Leif's idea or D's or both, but they decided to get an apartment in Tampa together.

Leif knew he was going to have to move out of the three rooms he occupied in our house before I completed the move from Kansas in September, so he saw this as an opportunity to move out and live with someone captivating who could help with the rent, and he hoped it would "go somewhere," in his terms.

D was very different from other women Leif was involved with, at least the ones I'd met. She was street smart and had had a very tough childhood. She was funny and cute, mercurial, and talked so fast it could make your head swim. I liked her, but sometimes she was so hyper she made me nervous. I remember standing with both of them in our kitchen when they announced that they were moving in together in Tampa and saying, "It's too soon. You don't know each other well enough yet. You've both had some very sad and tough times and neither of you can emotionally afford another romantic disaster." I told D that I didn't have anything against her. I didn't know her well enough to have any negative feelings about her, but I was worried they were making a big mistake to move in with each other after only knowing each other for three weeks or less. They both pooh-poohed my concerns. I think Leif thought that he would be able to enjoy her companionship and what he then felt was an endearing flightiness and have someone to share expenses. I don't think he ever felt he was going to get in too deep. Although he was captivated when he moved out of here, he wasn't yet in love.

They found an apartment in Tampa and we asked them whether it was a good neighborhood. Leif told us it was. Unfortunately, it wasn't. It was in that apartment that they were robbed a mere five months later in July 2006. It was a small two-bedroom, ground floor apartment in an older complex. Since I was still going back and forth to Kansas in those days, I didn't see much of Leif except once or twice each time I was back in Florida, and only heard from him occasionally.

D was a part time model and she modeled at the Daytona Bike Week. Leif took her there in March for modeling jobs. Things did not go smoothly and the trip cost him money and time he didn't really have to spare and he was falling into debt again, though he didn't admit that to us at all. D had trouble holding down a job and with Leif's spending habits and the added expenses of an apartment, utilities and a second person, he was not able to keep up with the financial situation. He did admit to us that money was tight, but not that he was building up credit card debt fast.

There were other issues that cropped up between them that spring, and in an attempt to deal with them in a light-hearted manner, he wrote a "job description" of a live-in girlfriend. Leif was not, in general, a demanding man, but he did have standards and he did have expectations. Though he chose to handle this in a somewhat joking manner, you can read between the lines about why he felt he should write it at all. Things were rocky, but he was still hoping they would work out.

From: Leif Garretson
Subject: Job Posting
Date: Wednesday, April 5, 2006, 8:52 PM

The following document shouldn't be taken too seriously or literally, and considered with a sense of humor, for it is an analogy or metaphor. It is not intended to suggest that a Girlfriend is an "employee." So read it, learn from it, and reference it if you need to.

Position: "Live In Girlfriend"

Employer: Leif

The following is a listing for the position of Live-in Girlfriend. This is a semi-permanent to permanent position with potential for advancement for a qualified and dedicated individual offering significant benefits proportional to the applicant's qualifications and performance.

QUALIFICATIONS:
Applicants must be female and either bi or heterosexual. They should be between 21 and 31 years of age and seeking permanent satisfying employment. Motivation and high sex drive are a must. As they will be working for a very sexual and visually oriented employer it is necessary to maintain physical fitness and an overall attractive and stimulating appearance. The appearance and behavior reflect on the employer and a successful applicant must be willing to put her best foot forward in representing herself and her employer. As part of the specifics of the appearance required, any applicant will be expected to maintain a slender build, typically weighing 100-130 pounds, unless unusually tall or short. Applicant must, with reasonable exceptions, maintain a well-kempt, feminine appearance that is attractive to her employer. The quality of that appearance and the consistency with which it is maintained will be directly proportional to benefits and compensation both, deliberate and unconscious.

Applicant must accept that she is in a mature environment free of unnecessary drama or conflict and excessive outbursts or immature, overly emotional behavior; particularly, ones which may disturb neighbors or embarrass the employer will not be tolerated. No allowance or exception will be made to this rule for use of alcohol, as immature behavior is not excused due to inebriation.

A successful applicant must be driven to better herself and assist her employer in doing the same. She must cooperate in joint efforts to maintain physical fitness and/or curb destructive vices.

The person that will succeed at this job is one that will take pride in her position and who will seek to make her employer proud of her. She should understand that her actions do not exist in a vacuum, but rather that everything she does, private or public, to include personal appearance, demeanor, and behavior, reflect on her employer. Only a person that is able to portray themselves in a positive and flattering light that will reflect well on her employer amongst others, so that she is a credit to him, will have opportunity for promotion or advancement.

She will have to leave past dramas or patterns of dealing with difficulty behind and embrace a more mature, enlightened way of dealing with things.

She should seek to better herself through the pursuit of education and employment and make goals for each.

Ultimately, to advance from this position to a more permanent one, such as "Wife,” she must be willing to consider breast augmentation to an impressive but not ridiculous bustline.

DUTIES:

Applicant will be expected to maintain a generally attractive, feminine, appearance. Clothes, hair, make-up, physical fitness and behavior are aspects of this. Slovenly, lazy, or unkempt appearance are not acceptable save for sick or morning after-days. Barring such exceptions, or obvious work-related attire, will be expected to look nice, with hair and make up done and decent clothes. Applicant must take pride in her appearance as Leif's Lady, as she is a representative of her employer.

Applicant will be expected to maintain reasonable employment and contribute to household expenses as well as her own. Leif may, at his sole discretion, chose to supplement this income to provide clothes, lingerie, make up, etc., to make the above task easier, or out of simple generosity. Any activities suggested by the employer he will expect to pay for, such as dinner out, etc. However, the applicant should be pulling her own weight and not be excessively asking for help with expenses that are not shared. Contraception is considered a shared expense. However, things like cigarettes, or other expenses which are not necessary for the fulfilling of any expected tasks, are not Leif's responsibility and should be budgeted for or eliminated by the applicant.

Any individual that accepts the position must expect to be sexually available as well as desirable.

A live-in girlfriend will be expected to cook, clean, and do laundry, though will not be solely responsible for those actions. Leif will participate in all to the degree necessary or appropriate and no further explanation of these tasks will be given unless it becomes disproportionate to the point it is a problem.

A successful applicant will also share as many non-sexual activities as possible, such as movies, TV, and games whenever possible and should keep in mind that if the above requirements for attractiveness and sexual desirability are met, she should not have to compete with things like PlanetSide. Historically, it is evident that when a girlfriend is thin and hot and sexy, PlanetSide does not see much of "Graeloch."

PHILOSOPHY:

Below is some clarification, explanation or justification for the requirements above, to explain why they are so important.

Weight: I have discussed some of this, but partly it is that opposites attract. I look for in a woman what I see lacking in myself. I am attracted to very thin, slight, feminine women. I am a conqueror and I want someone that looks ripe for conquering, not someone that looks like a worthy adversary. Also, because after the conquering is done, I am a protector. Small, fragile women make me feel protective and powerful. Visually, a light, cat-like build turns me on. Call it shallow if you like; I know what I like. I may not give you shit if you are not as thin as I like, but my desire will not be there.

Appearance and behavior: Again, what you look like, say and do is a reflection on me. You are not just D, you are Leif's Girlfriend. Be one that I would be proud of. Don't ever be one that I would be ashamed of because of how you look or behave. Again, think of what you think My Lady should be like. If you were to write a story about me in this or any other time, and you had to describe my Lady, the woman that you would expect to see at the side of a man like me, what would she be like? How would she look and how would she act?

------------------------------

The two photos of Leif with the blue hair were taken on his last day of seventh grade in June 1988 when they were having some kind of a goofy dress-up day. He was a student at Northwood Junior High School in Highland Park, Illinois. They may seem an odd choice to put with this post, but since it starts out mentioning Douglas Adams and "42," I chose them because that was the period when he read those books and practically memorized them. He could recite whole passages. They made a profound effect on his life and he talked about them all the years he lived after this.

The Lack of a Home

It struck me as I was recounting all of the places that Leif lived in his 33 years, and came up with 24 of them, that such instability of a home wasn't a good thing, either. As a military family, we usually had three years in one place, sometimes four, and only once, two. That meant that for the first 20 years of Leif's life, he lived in 9 places with us, and one of them was the old stone house that remained a kind of rooted base for us, that he lived in two out of the nine times I'm counting. It was after her left home that he really became peripatetic, and each time he moved it was either to find a better or cheaper place. Probably the nicest place he lived in his adult life (other than the houses we owned at 710 N. 9th Street in Manhattan or our home here in Florida) was the apartment he and Nikko had in the army housing area in Watertown, New York, but it was also one of the places he was unhappiest.

The stability in his life was always us. Nothing else remained constant or anything he could count on. I hope he felt he could count on us, but I know as a grown man he didn't want to have to.

Living in 15 places in 13 years is too much change, even if he initiated the moves. It means there is no real home, no identity or the sense of place.

Once of the things he and I once talked about was that when I was growing up and in earlier generations, girls and young women were taught that it was their responsibility to make a house a home. I know there are those who would now say that was sexist and is outmoded, but I don't think so. I do believe that it is also a man's responsibility to be a part of that, making a house a home, and I don't think what I'm talking about has much to do with whether one sex or the other does the cooking or the laundry. Household chores ought to be divided equitably and by who does them best . . . or is most willing to do them. But making a house or apartment FEEL like a home is something I still think a woman needs to do. Otherwise, a man and a woman living together are really just roommates, regardless of whether they are married or having a sexual relationship. A home is different than just sharing living space. I don't think Leif ever felt he had that kind of home. The PLACE one calls home is less important (even with a lot of moves) than the atmosphere within it.

A part of that (not the most important part, but a part) is housekeeping. As I've mentioned, Leif was a terrible housekeeper if left on his own, but would willingly work WITH someone else to clean and straighten a place up. I have a threshhold of clutter that drives me nuts and makes me depressed if I don't do anything about it. I think Leif would pass way beyond that to the point where he was depressed and it looked like such a horrible task to try to tackle the mess that he just ignored it unless he thought a new woman in his life might be coming over and then he would clean it up.

I once gave him a certificate I made up on the computer for his birthday, which was good for eight not-necessarily-consecutive hours of housework cleaning up his place. He laughed, but he made good use of it, and he did work while I was there working. We got a lot done.

Each time he moved into a new place, he would fix it up pretty nicely and had some pride in how it looked, but it didn't take long for clutter and apathy to take over, and without a mate to either clean it up or engage him in doing it with her it just looked like to enormous a task. Leif would insist he didn't even see the mess, that he had a male "target mentality," so that he only saw what he was looking for or working with. Maybe, but I don't think so. i think he just ignored it and lived with it, but I can't believe it was the way he wanted to live or would have if he'd had the right companion.

It makes me sad to think that he never really had a home as an adult. Places to live, yes, and brief periods where he liked them and was happier, but living with someone you aren't getting along with, or living alone and being lonely, is not having a home. How I wish he had had at least that. It might have made a difference.
----------------------------

The photo of Leif was a self-portrait taken on April 26, 2003 at the 710 N. 9th Street house in Manhattan, Kansas.

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.

----------------------------
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.
---------------

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-Second Home - Tampa, Florida - February to October 2006

When Leif moved to Tampa with Donna in February 2006, his dad asked him whether the apartment he had leased on E. Sligh Avenue was in a safe neighborhood. Leif insisted it was. I don't know whether he really believed that, or whether he was just reassuring us. In truth, I think that he probably did think it was safe, since he had lived in so many different places with some many different kinds of people safely. It looked like a peaceful enough neighborhood.

However, he began to have problems not long after he moved in. He wanted to keep his car and his cycle in pristine condition, and was vastly annoyed at dings on his car doors. However, that was the least of his problems. Five months after he moved in, in July 2006, I got a call from him saying he and Donna would not be able to come to our house for dinner with the family (his brother, Peter Anthony and family were here visiting) because that afternoon, in broad daylight, while he was gone for only an hour (it was his day off), someone had jimmied the lock on his patio door and broken into his first floor apartment. They had kicked in the locked bedroom door and ransacked the entire place. They stole his guns, a laptop computer, cell phone, jewelry, and more. They broke the door frame, broke the king-sized bed frame upending it looking for loot.

He and Donna were afraid, knowing that the thieves had his guns and could so easily get into the apartment. The management didn't fix the patio door or provide them with any kind of secure way to close it, so Leif jammed a shower curtain rod in the frame to try to prevent the door from opening and piled an extra mattress against it. He had quite a time doing the claim for his insurance, and luckily had renter's insurance that covered his belongings.

Ninety days after the burglary, the management still hadn't fixed any of the damage, not the broken patio door lock, not the splintered bedroom door frame, not the bedroom door with the big hole kicked in it, and Leif had enough. He decided to break his lease, use some of his insurance money, and move out. He thought he had taken care of everything with the management, but not long after he moved out, he was presented with a bill for over $900, with a claim that he had not put down any cleaning deposit, so they wanted to charge him to clean an apartment that had been appallingly dirty when he rented it. He had dated photos to show that, including the electric stove burner burn on the kitchen floor that the were now trying to charge him for. They also were charging him for breaking his lease.

Fortunately, Leif had his copy of the lease which proved that he had paid a cleaning and security deposit, and they apparently couldn't find their copy, or at least they never produced it when we requested to see it. He also had documented the break-in extensively with photos, and the aftermath showing that things had not been fixed. He felt they had not upheld their end of the lease by providing a safe, habitable apartment.

We spent many hours documenting their negligence in not repairing the damage that was dangerous to human habitation and contesting their charges. They continued for nearly a year and a half to try to collect the money, finally sending the account to a collection agency. When we sent the collection agency the entire file with photos and all the communications, they dropped the attempt to collect, but this went on until just a few months before Leif's death.

He and Donna lived on the first floor at the back of the building on the left. The other photo is of the damage to the sliding glass door. You can see all of the pry marks that completely bent the metal and destroyed the lock.

What no one tells you about a death in the family.

We've all been to funerals. We've all seen them in the movies and on television. We've all seen death on the screen and some of us have seen it in person, but what none of those things show us is reality. None of them prepares you for the depth of emotion when a beloved child, or any age, dies. None of them tells you that you will be plunged into a whirlwind of activity to try to plan a funeral or memorial service, arrange for cremation, find a place for burial or inurnment, notify relatives and friends, figure out what to do about the deceased person's mail, accounts, and belongings.

Sometimes, if someone is anticipating a death or is old, there might have been some preparations made, such as a planned funeral or the purchase of a cemetery plot, but in the case of an unexpected death of a young person, in addition of the shock of their death comes the shock of everything you have to do and all the paperwork that comes with it. I found myself dealing with Leif's workplace, his insurance, his apartment complex, several government offices concerning his veteran's benefits and retired military pay, the national cemetery. I tried to find out how to let his friends know, since I didn't know all of them or how to contact them. I needed to contact his bank, credit card and loan accounts. I had to find a location to hold his memorial services and pick a date.

Because of the manner of Leif's death, I also found myself dealing with law enforcement, the medical examiner's office, the investigating detective, the sheriff's records department.

I had to keep records and account for everything so that I would know what was happening and could follow the myriad conversations with so many people I never even met.

I wanted to create a digital slide show of Leif's life so I started scanning photos by the dozens, finally coming up with the completed show the night before the memorial services, comprised of over 400 slides.

How does one create a meaningful memorial service for a man who professed to be at least an agnostic, if not an atheist? How does one create a service that honors who we really was and how we felt about him?

How does one go about cleaning out his apartment, selling his furniture, giving away his clothing, taking his carefully constructed life apart piece by piece?

That is what you have to do. This is a part of death, and that is what I found to be all-consuming. I moved forward alternating between businesslike numbness and periods when I would break down in tears.

Somehow the things that had to get done within the month after he died got done. Somehow we were fortunate and found the St. Petersburg Unitarian Universalist Church and Bay Pines National Cemetery.

Somehow we managed to clean out Leif's apartment in time to avoid paying another month's rent. Going back there was a sad reminder of the day we found him there, but eventually, it was just a place with walls; nothing of his remained.

I did what I had to do, and then other family needs intervened. I still have belongings of Leif's here that I need to sell or give away. I still get mail for him. On rare occasions, I even see someone who knew him "friend" him on Facebook or MySpace without reading his profile, not knowing he is dead, and I try to let them know.

Today is Peter W's birthday. Last year, his 65th birthday started out to be a totally unhappy and depressive day, just three days after we found Leif. Leif had always been there for his dad's birthdays, except for the three years he was in the army. We always looked forward to his being with us and now he would not be there ever again.

We were both sobbing and crying. The day was saved by my sister, Lannay, my nephew, Rick, and his wife Mac, and their two sweet daughters Kimberly and Christina. They drove all night from Washington DC to be with us, just for that one day. The girls climbed up in Peter's lap and cheered him up. He read to them. Mac cooked a great Thai dinner and I made a Black Forest Cherry cake. We managed to celebrate his birthday. I will always be grateful that they came, for their love, for the girls' charm and sweetness. They came back later in the month for the memorial services and stayed for a week to help out.

This year Peter's birthday will be less tragic, less sad. This year we can try to focus on each other. We will enjoy our time together. Leif will be in our thoughts, always, but the pain is lessened after a year. This birthday will be better than last year.
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This time the photo is of me, because I'm the one who had to take hold and do all those things after Leif died, and I'm the one remembering. The photo was taken April 11, 2009 using PhotoBooth and the Colored Pencil effect.

The Day Leif Died - April 9, 2008

The day Leif died, April 9, 2008, we had no idea anything was wrong until just after 1:00 p.m. I got call from Rodney, his supervisor at Humana where Leif worked. He said Leif hadn't showed up for work that morning and he was unable to reach him by phone or text message. He was worried, he said, because Leif was always reliable and always called in if he was sick. He knew Leif rode a motorcycle and knew of his accident the previous July. He wondered if something had happened to him.

I was concerned, but not scared at that point. I told Rodney I would try to find Leif and would ask Leif to call him, or I would. I was startled to get his call, though, because never in all the years Leif worked had I ever had a call from a supervisor of his, or anyone at the places he worked, saying he hadn't shown up. I was the emergency contact in Leif's record and that's why Rodney called me, a good supervisor trying to find out if his team member was safe, not just be mad at him for not showing up.

I then started calling Leif, over and over, on all three of his phones and sending text messages to the cell phones as well. He preferred text messaging and we did a lot of that. Here are the messages I sent to his iPhone:

"Are you ok? Your supervisor just called. Said you are several hours late for work and has heard nothing from you. Rodney XXXXXX. XXX-XXX-XXX. Call me. I am worried!" (Xed out phone number and last name for this blog.)
1:01:27 PM

"Where are you?"
1:07:17 PM

"Called Rodney back and said i couldn't get in touch with you. He said he was worried because you ride the bike on days like this. Hope you are ok and aren't jeopardizing your job. Worried!"
1:14:52 PM

"More and more worried! Where are you? Asleep? Wrecked? Hurt? Drunk? Run away?"
1:36:55 PM

"Hard to believe you would still be asleep on a workday even if you missed your alarm. My anxiety level is rising rapidly. Call. Text. Something!"
2:20:47 PM

"Wilson said he would let me know if he heard from you and he hasn't called so I guess you still haven't made it to work or called him. It's almost 3 pm."
2:56:07 PM

"Wondering if I should call your apt manager to check on you or drive there. But don't know how I could get in."
2:56:10 PM

"Please, son, let me know you are ok."
3:34:20 PM

"You in a coma? Know what day it is? Time?"
3:51:30 PM

"My imagination isn't doing me any favors. Please let me know what's up!"
4:24:41 PM

"Going to work out and swim. Taking this phone. Wonder if i should be driving there instead. I hope there is some good explanation for this that doesn't involve injury or worse."
4:28:43 PM

"In my overwrought imagination, I can only think of 4 reasons you can't reply with a txt msg. Lost both phones. Badly injured. In jail. Dead. Unless of course you are so pissed off at me you want me to worry like this, but I can't figure out any reason for that to be so. Gad, it's been over 4 hours since your boss called. Nothing. I'm scared."
5:07:22 PM

"Do I need to start calling hospitals? Would they even tell me if you were there with our privacy laws?"
5:44:28 PM

"Hell, I don't know where you are, can't even get into your apt to check on you. I'm going to start calling hospitals and the police if I don't hear from you by 9 pm."
8:20:53 PM

"If you are there and able to respond, please do. Talked to Michael. He said he was with you drinking til 3 am but left you ok. He hasn't gotten an answer from you, either. He is going to send someone from Tally Ho over to see if your car and bike are there. If they are and you don't answer the door, Michael wants them to call 911 and break in."
11:46:59 PM

I stayed in contact with Michael until after 1:00 a.m. He tried calling Leif numerous times. He was in Atlanta for a trade show, had gone there that day. He was frantic, too. We both were waiting for someone from Tally Ho, the pub across the street, to go check, and someone there said they would, but they never did. At that point I went to bed, resolved that if I hadn't heard from Leif or found out what was happening, I would drive to his apartment and figure out some way to get in if both vehicles were there. I don't know what I would have done if only one were there. That would have meant he had gone somewhere with the other one.

I've asked myself a thousand times why I didn't go to his apartment that afternoon and the answer is always the same. I thought that either he was not there, or if he was, he was deliberately not communicating (which had happened before), in which case he would not like or welcome the melodrama of his mother driving 30 miles to check up on him, or if he couldn't communicate, it was likely too late. Neither Peter W. nor I wanted to really contemplate whether Leif could be dead at home. It made no sense. After 5 p.m. no one was in the apartment management offices. I tried to call that evening and couldn't reach anyone.

I did call hospitals that night. None of them had him listed as a patient. I called the sheriff's office thinking there might have been an accident report, or that he might have been arrested for something. I even called the sheriff's offices in the counties between here and where D., the one he had just fallen in love with, lived, in case something had happened to him on the way there or back.

I had thought he might go to visit her on his day off and even stay overnight. I know he had wanted to do that. Maybe he had been too tired to drive back, was asleep with his phones turned off. Maybe he thought he had gotten Wednesday off, too, and had his schedule mixed up and was spending time with her.

I was hoping that one of these things was true, but my mind was telling me that something was terribly wrong. I envisioned him off the road somewhere after a cycle accident, not found yet. I envisioned him very ill with some awful asthma attack. I even envisioned him in a drunken stupor, but I never imagined that he had shot himself in his apartment, not during that day. I began to fear his death by the time I went to bed but I tried to keep hoping I would hear from him and he was all right.

As it turns out, it wouldn't have made any difference if I had gone to Tampa and gotten into his apartment somehow, because he was already dead long before Rodney tried to contact him about missing his shift.

Sometime between 3 a.m. when Michael and Jaime left and 8 a.m. when he was due at work, he loaded the new Springfield XD pistol and shot himself in the head in the kitchen of his apartment. We were told he died instantly. I hope that is true.
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The eerie photo above was one or a series Leif made of himself with a gun using the PhotoBooth program on his iMac. He experimented with the sepia and negative effects. This one is just how he made it except that I deleted the apartment background. Somehow it seems appropriate, ghostly, for remembering the day of his death. He actually made the photo on 11-22-07 at a time when he was depressed and felt his life had no purpose.

An Overwhelming Load - Leif - Sun City Center, Florida - May 13, 2007 - Age 32

Leif's adult life was strewn with disappointments and stresses, beginning with the financial problems he had in college, the health problems and misery he experienced because of them in the army, the loss of his marriage, and the resulting depression. There was a brief respite and happiness during the time following his college graduation in May 2003 when he was working and met J. and was in love. Then he plunged into the depths of depression again when she left him in March 2004. He continued to work in Manhattan, Kansas but was dying on the vine and wanted so badly to move away to Florida.

We moved him there in March 2005. He found a job with Amscot which he thought would lead to a good career with a good salary. He was doing well and had become an assistant manager until a jealous colleague made problems for him and his hopes ended. He went to work for Alltel, which gave him a bit of longevity because Alltel purchased Western Wireless where he had worked in Kansas. It was call center work again, which he was good at but it wasn't good for him because it tied him to a cubicle on the phone for eight hours a day. He gained weight from being sedentary. His shifts were often afternoon and evening shifts which meant it was late when he got off work and not a good time to get any exercise. Then he would stay up even later gaming.

Later, Alltel changed their pay policies so that his pay fell by 19% and he looked for another job. He found one in the same complex working at the Humana call center as a customer service representative for Medicare clients. He learned a lot about the American health system and it incensed him. He became truly angry at the lack of care for people without insurance and the denial of services to some that did, the cost shares and deductibles that made it hard for even those with health insurance to afford care. He was an advocate for a national health insurance system.

Meanwhile, life in Florida was not what he had dreamed of. In addition to the everyday need to work and take care of the mundane business of life which makes life even in a place like Florida pretty much like elsewhere, his asthma continued to cause him problems, and love continued to elude him.

Sometime in 2005, he had the minor accident with his prized new Suzuki and scraped it all up. (He replaced all parts to pristine new condition.)

December 23, 2005, Leif called me (I was still in Kansas) to tell me he had been in a car accident in Tampa. His black Dodge Stratus Coupe had been totaled. Luckily, he was not seriously injured, but the accident did damage his neck and he had to use a traction device. It caused him pain from then on.

In July 2006, his apartment in Tampa was broken into, the locked door to his bedroom kicked in, and most of his valuables were stolen, including cell phones, computer, and guns. He and Donna lived on the first floor and the thieves had come into the place through a sliding glass patio door in broad daylight in the afternoon. Supposedly no one saw them. The place was a wreck. Donna was scared out of her wits, with strangers out there who could get in at will having guns they could easily use on them.

The apartment complex didn't fix the broken lock on the patio door or provide any security, nor did they repair the broken bedroom door and left exposed nails sticking out of the door frame, for 90 days. At that point, Leif had enough and decided to take his insurance money and break his lease, thinking he could do so because the premises were literally not safely inhabitable. If I had been in his shoes, I would have been both frightened and extremely upset. The apartment management continued to hound him for the next year and half, claiming he had no deposit (we had proof he did), that he had caused damage he didn't cause (he had proof in the form of photos he took when he moved in of the damage they said he caused).

Leif moved to a different apartment complex to a nicer apartment but even there, he was not immune to thieves. On May 4, 2007, at 12:36 PM, Leif Garretson sent this text message to me, "When it rains, it pours. Motorcycle got stolen last night." That was the end of the speedy yellow Suzuki.

Then in July 2007, he broke up with Donna and had the more serious motorcycle accident with the Honda cycle, and the collarbone surgery.

He went back to school (continuing to work full time) in the fall of 2007 at USF in Tampa, which wasn't far from his apartment. He wanted to major in philosophy, and wanted to use the rest of his GI Bill benefits, partly for the education and partly to help out his finances. He enjoyed being on campus again but it was hard to juggle the classes with his work schedule, especially when the work schedule would change abruptly. By November, he was becoming very lonely and depressed, without purpose, as he wrote in the email to me that I posted yesterday.

At work, he had been interviewed for promotions several times. Each time he would get his hopes up that he would get a supervisory position, and each time he was not selected. He had a lot of good ideas and leadership ability and wanted a chance to put those skills to use, but each time his hopes were dashed and he remained tethered to the phone in a cubicle.

I had been trying to get Leif to look for a different kind of job but because he lacked focus and didn't know what he wanted to to with his life (other than things that were out of his reach like being a race car driver or pilot), and because he was depressed, he didn't have the drive or ambition to work on seeking other jobs. He did finally apply for a call center position with USAA, a company he would very much have liked to work for, and was interviewed. However, when the told him the salary range, he told them he'd have to have the top of the range because otherwise it would be a lower salary than he was getting at Humana. He was not offered the job, and that was another disappointment.

Then, in February 2008, after he had already paid the tuition and could no longer get it back, USF pulled his GI Bill stipend and he fell into a financial hole he couldn't fill. He never told us about the condition of his finances, just that he was "broke," but Leif was ALWAYS "broke" so we didn't know it was really far worse. We had helped him out several times before and would have done it again, even though he owed us a lot of money he couldn't pay back, but I don't think his pride would let him tell us or ask for money, since he had insisted all fall that he was doing fine. I had worried about the way he was spending money and he said he had sold some belongings and was using insurance money for other purchases. Little did we know what was really happening.

Then in March 2008, a month before he died, he tried to get personal loans to cover his debts, and couldn't get them. He tried to get his credit limit on his credit cards raised and couldn't. He had run out of financial options. The only ones he had left were to declare bankruptcy or to come to us or a friend for money, and I don't think he was willing to do either.

Leif was a proud man, a man who believed he should show no weakness, a man who always put forth an image of a guy with the cool car and the cool bike and the cool gadgets. I don't think he wanted to give up that image.

So he came to April 2008, when he was again in love, with D., but didn't know how he was going to pay his phone bills, his credit cards, his car and insurance payments, his rent, his internet service, or how he would pay for gas to go see her. He was going to work to support his debts and his car and his apartment, without even money for good food. He must have felt it was not worth going on.

Leif had pulled his life out of a tailspin before, not once, but several times, and he believed he was strong and could handle anything. On July 5, 2006, the day of the apartment robbery, he sent this text message to me:

July 5, 2006 at 11:29 p.m. Leif Garretson wrote, "I am OK. You know me. I am the rock. Also the good thing about my life of having once been so dark as to make me want to end it, in overcoming it means there is nothing I can't handle. After that everything else is just a new adventure or challenge. I am so much stronger now. This did not even raise my pulse. Just a speed bump. The car is still running great. I see it almost as a good thing, it will allow me to move out of here."

It was that email and that he told me that he hadn't killed himself at Fort Drum because he knew what it would do to me that gave me hope that he would pull out of his depression, because he had before, because he was "the rock." I hoped he was. I wanted to believe that, even as I worried that he was more vulnerable than he admitted.

That was the way he portrayed himself. Strong. Could handle anything. Maybe at that moment he could. When did he pass that point?

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This photo was taken May 13, 2007, Mothers Day, the last time I saw him on a Mother's Day, at our home.

A Sad Week

I haven't posted anything for a whole week. It's been too busy with Leif's inurnment, memorial service, a lot of company and family staying at our home and in town, and there hasn't been time, but many of us have been remembering him, at each event and gathering.

Yesterday we finished cleaning out his apartment and today I turned in his keys. That was hard for me. Even though he hasn't been there since April 10th, and I know there is no reason for us to go back there, there is something sad and final about leaving it behind and turning over the keys.

I made a slide slow of his life for the evening gathering after the memorial service, 439 photos from birth to his last birthday, and it turned out very nice. It was good to see all the photos of the good times, and not just think of the last sad day.

Now, it's time to turn a lot of my attention to settling his affairs and figuring out what to do with all his things. It's a sad task, dismantling someone's life possessions, things that meant something to him, though there is also a lot of it he just threw in a box.