I Haven’t the Strength to Give Up
After my mother killed herself, I lived with my aunt for a year. I got the bedroom of her one-bedroom apartment and she took the foldout couch/bed, though the mattress was only as thick and cushioned as a little girl’s thigh.
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Why You Should Scare the Shit Out of You
Spend a moment thinking about the most dangerous person on earth. This sick fuck threatens your life, gets in your head and invades your privacy in ways that even your mother or the Bush Administration would never consider.
You can’t run. You can’t sneak under the stairs or migrate to a gated community or get a restraining order or put this person on some watch list. You can’t become a master of disguise or get massive plastic surgery to fool him. You can’t hide from her underneath your sheets—clutching and crushing a plush version of an animal that symbolizes you. And the worst news of all is that this person uses your toothbrush.
Because, obviously, the most dangerous person in the world is you.
No one big, tall, straight, gay, queer, Arab, Jew, terrorist, Taliban or teetotaler is as likely to do the harm to you as you will do to yourself.
And I’m not talking about the loads of sexual abuse you subject yourself to. And I’m not being metaphorical or satirical—yet.
I’m serious. You need to recognize that the person who is most likely to kill you knows where you keep your wallet, where the stains on your underoos are and what kinds of cold sores your tongue is messing with inside your mouth.
You are your worst enemy. It’s a fact.
After the age of twenty-five, you are more likely to kill yourself than ever be killed by anyone else. And the chance you will kill yourself increases every year or your life.
And don’t think the young aren’t after their own blood. If you’re under twenty-five, the danger you present to you is even more severe.
The two leading causes of death for 18-24 year are accidents and homicide.
Not all accidents are suicide, I guess. But examine the notion of an accident—a word that implies that every choice we made up the point of disaster does not matter.
There may be such thing as accidents but they exist only in the realm of circumstance.
Why did you drive recklessly? Why were you playing with a gun, that cocaine, that man’s wife, that giant vat of toxic waste, that boulder held in place by a daisy? Why do you insist on going out on Saturday night, the most dangerous night of the week?
I’m not saying you definitely absolutely want to kill yourself.
I’m saying you’re more cunning than that. Like most master criminals, you lurk and lurk and strike only when the distractions are high, when the mood and sky is dark.
You keep yourself guessing. That’s why you’re so damn scary.
And that’s just the active ways you go about killing yourself.
We’re all eating, drinking and breathing ourselves to death.
The two leading causes of death in this country are Heart Disease and Cancer. We don’t know for certain what causes either of these conditions both offer the confusion of an accident, certain behaviors definitely make you more inclined to suffer them.
But what of the obese man whose heart never gives? What about Keith Richards and Dick Cheney? Your granny who smoked crack until she was ninety?
These exceptions just give you permission to become even more dangerous.
They make a two-pack a day habit into a bold embrace of life. They let you choose Nutrasweet over sugar because Cancer seems less ominous than belly rolls.
You’re a madman with a cross to bear and death wish to make as you blow out the candles of life. There’s no denying that.
You’ve got a knife to your throat or a knife to a plump piece of cheesecake, and you’re not giving in until you meet your demands. You will not stop until you are dead and gone. I know it.
So spend a little less time worrying about the bad guys and the burglars and whatever minority group happens to live too close to you.
You should probably spend a little more time worrying about the killer that’s there even when you’re wiping your rear—you.
What You Need to Know About Murder
I know it: Worrying makes the terrible things we fear more likely to happen. Now, I don’t believe in a direct, cause-and-effect, soup-to-nuts relationship between worry and disaster. But our brains are magnets, and we cannot help but attract or reflect the contents of our mind into the real world.
When we’re depressed, we see the world through poo-colored glasses. On the other paw, optimism pays off—even if we do not get exactly what we want in life. If we expect to do ok, our brain will make it so we see even negative outcomes as “meant to be” or “worth the minor STD on my toe” or “better than jail time.”
So, when your Worrier worries, he does so knowing there is a cost. Even though I fully expect to die either in a car accident or in aftermath of feces play, I still sandbag against inevitability. I take precautions: I always wear my seat belt and latex gloves.
And I constantly probe the news, statistics and other neurotics so that I can worry more effectively. I cautiously seer into the ever-frightening future and fret: Am I more likely to die on the weekend or during the week? Or, When do more people get killed, day or night? And most often I wonder: Who’s going to kill me?
Now I know the odds are that no one is going to kill me. The odds are much better that I’ll die in an accident or kill myself either by suicide or slowly by smoking, eating or breathing too much.
But forget the odds. For some reason, worries tend toward murder and how to avoid it. In some reptilian part of our brain, we’re all being hunted. And I want to know EXACTLY who is going to kill me. And if I can’t know exactly, I want to know enough statistics so that I can make a very faulty hypothesis.
So here is exactly what you need to know about being killed.
1. Men get killed way more often than women.
In 2005, 4 men were killed for every 1 woman. This isn’t to say that it’s safer to be a woman at all. 1 in 6 women will be sexually assaulted in their lifetime, compared to 1 in 33 men . While I think that statistic is definitely underreported, the fact is that in this sick society women get raped and men get killed. 65% of murders are men killing men, which, considering all the raping going on, doesn’t seem like such a terrible thing. 23% are men killing women. 10% were women killing men while on 2% of all murders are females killing other females, which is probably why mud wrestling comes off as so safe and fun.
2. Worry about the people you know.
Women should be cautious of their lovers. 1/3 of women murder victims were killed by someone they were “intimate” with. Only 3% of men were killed by an intimate. Strangers get a bad rap in our society. Even the term comes off creepy. But if you’re female, you have to keep in mind that even the person you’re boning is a bit strange. Women are also more likely to be killed by a family member or an acquaintance than a man is. A stranger murdered only 9% of women. 16% of men are reported murdered by a stranger, which just means that the relationship couldn’t be determined. I really don’t think that the random murder of strangers is worth worrying about, not with our friends and families out to get us.
3. White people generally kill white people; black people kill black people
Almost half of all murders were a white person killing a white person. About 41% were black people killing black people. Less than 9% of murders were a black person killing a white person. Only 4% of murders involved a white person killing a black person, which is a nice respite from the 400 years of genocide and torture of the slave trade. Black immigrants have way lower homicide rates than native black Americans.
4. Teenagers and people in their young 20s are most likely to be killed.
Females in this age group are also 4 times more likely to be raped. It’s when we are most reckless and I recommend avoiding this period of your life completely, if possible. 25-34 is the next most dangerous age, which is certainly why the framers picked 35 as the minimum age for the President.
5. Saturday, followed closely by Friday, is the most muderous day of the week.
6. The day gets more dangerous as it gets later.
Mornings are the safest time of day. Afternoons are slightly more dangerous. Starting at 6 PM murder rates go way up, peaking at 11 PM. Note to Worriers: Stay home at night and on Fridays and Saturdays.
7. You can get killed at work.
About 800 people get killed every year at work. Men are 4 times as likely to die while working, but death is the leading occupational injury for women. I can’t think of anything worse than dying at work, which is why it’ll probably happen to me.
8. Driving a cab is the most dangerous job in America.
15 out 100,000 cab drivers are killed every year compared to 9 out of 100,000 police officers. The other dangerous jobs are pretty obvious: Hotel clerks, liquor store clerks, gas station workers and security guards.
9. Intoxication kills.
Victims are likely to be intoxicated so are murderers.
10. Resisting seems like a good idea.
A Department of Justice study of survivors of nearly fatal attacks found that 63% of victims felt their resistance helped them. Only 7% felt it was harmful. Of course, you can’t interview those who didn’t survive.
11. Guns kill better.
2/3 of all murders involved guns. Sharp instruments are the second most popular murder weapon at 17%. Blunt instruments, like a trumpet, I guess, were used in only 6%. There is no statistical breakout for candlesticks, wrenches or lead pipes. Now, I’m one of those people who wish that all handguns were illegal (or nearly impossible to get). I know: Then only criminals will have guns. But given how much more likely we are to be killed by someone we know than a stranger—I’m willing to risk it.
12. You probably won’t be murdered.
1 out of 217 Americans will be murdered in his or her lifetime. In one year, that’s 1 out of 16, 919, or a very large hockey crowd. Thinking of murder statistics in terms of hockey crowds makes the whole thing much easier to take, I find. 1 in 5 of us will die from Heart Disease. 1 of 84 will die in car accidents. If you want to think about who’s stalking you, it’s cancer and emphysema. And they know where you live.
Death isn’t a joke, but it is the Worrier’s job to consider it dispassionately. Thusly I remind you: beware the friend, family member or acquaintance that shows up drunk at Saturday night at 11 PM with a gun and a smile. Otherwise you should be just fine.
(All praises to Ben Best whose research on “Death By Murder” I borrowed excessively from. US Department of Justice’s homicide statistics.)