The House of Fate, cont.

Some time back, I posted this Emerson quote on R&K. At the time, things were weighing heavily on my mind – the choices we make, why we do things, how eventually we become the product of our own choices. Whether we want to or not.

“But these shocks and ruins are less destructive to us, than the stealthy power of other laws which act upon us daily. An expense of ends to means is fact; — organization tyrannizing over character. The menegerie, of forms and powers of the spine, is a book of fate: the bill of the bird, the skull of the snake, determines tyrannically its limits. So is the scale of races, of temperaments; so is sex; so is climate; so is the reaction of talents imprisoning the vital power in certain directions. Every spirit makes its house; but afterwards the house confines the spirit.”

– Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Fate”, 1860

Two days ago, a 44-year-old man died in an Orlando bathroom. Neither of us knew him personally; I only knew of him. He very nearly almost married one of my best friends, almost ten years ago now. He had problems, even then, but as I’d heard the story, over the years since he’d steadily been rolling downhill. Burning bridges, antagonizing friends and family, finally settling into a very unhappy marriage and a serious alcohol problem. My friend stayed close with his family, and so she received news updates every so often about him and how his life was going.

He made a lot of bad choices. A lot of them. By the time they found him, he’d just about hit the end anyway. His family couldn’t stand him; no wife, kids, or prospects; no career to speak of; no real education; a substance abuse problem. Right now we don’t know whether it was natural causes, or if he took his own life. Even if it was natural, though, there are many ways to speed one’s exit from this world if one is so inclined. No matter how you cut it, he became the product of his own shortsighted choices.

It’s just so sad.

He’s been a regular topic of conversation around here this week. No one deserves to die like that: alone, miserable, still young and out of options. It’s caused us both to reflect on our own choices, people we’ve known, how lots of little decisions all led us to this place in time. And how grateful we are for the lives we have.