Charlie O'Hay
"All the other times I've died..."
I'd never heard a sentence begin that way until today,when I met Nathan. Like many of the travelers I've met, he was just passing thru when he became stranded. In Nathan's case, he was supposed to jump an outbound freight but unfortunately overdosed on heroin and ended up dead. Yes, dead. For 17 minutes. Two shots of Narcon later, he woke up. I had to ask if he'd experienced anything unusual (or even supernatural) during his absence. "All the other time I've died..." he began. I stopped him there. "Other times?" I asked. He explained that as a teen he'd tried suicide: four times. Each time he was revived. After one such resurrection, he cold-cocked the ER doc in the jaw. The OD, he said, was different. "There was just this dark space." He said he could hear a breeze but couldn't feel it. He could move about, but since everything was dark, there was no place to go. Since then he's quit heroin. But he's still in Philly. So his problems aren't exactly over.
"All the other times I've died..."
I'd never heard a sentence begin that way until today,when I met Nathan. Like many of the travelers I've met, he was just passing thru when he became stranded. In Nathan's case, he was supposed to jump an outbound freight but unfortunately overdosed on heroin and ended up dead. Yes, dead. For 17 minutes. Two shots of Narcon later, he woke up. I had to ask if he'd experienced anything unusual (or even supernatural) during his absence. "All the other time I've died..." he began. I stopped him there. "Other times?" I asked. He explained that as a teen he'd tried suicide: four times. Each time he was revived. After one such resurrection, he cold-cocked the ER doc in the jaw. The OD, he said, was different. "There was just this dark space." He said he could hear a breeze but couldn't feel it. He could move about, but since everything was dark, there was no place to go. Since then he's quit heroin. But he's still in Philly. So his problems aren't exactly over.