Death is not the Answer...
...except when it is. Aside from my "new age" belief in the right to die and my anachronistic notions of personal honor, suicide is never the answer. It has become apparent to me that losing a peer will never be easy at any point in life. The reason for this should be obvious; if one is your peer, then you identify with them. You can see your mortality in the end of theirs . It's not purely demographic as some circles tend to believe. I've lost plenty of friends who are not "peers" in the sense that, while we may have had good conversations and learned from each other, it was understood that we were just friendly strangers passing through each others' lives. While there has always been some sadness in those cases, it was short-lived, stymied by the knowledge that their suffering had ended. This knowledge was realized through the profound (to me) statement by the Dalai Lama, who said (paraphrased) that he found it ironic that people celebrate birt