Trying to deal

I don't know how many of you knew tenebraeli, aka Olwen. I didn't know her, beyond the occasional comment on each others' lj - y'know, when you surf friends' friends out of curiosity, add them for a while, de-friend when you're bored, they've still got you friended, and occasionally you check on them out of curiosity.

Olwen was... well, she got depressed. A lot. Got locked into her situation, left it a couple of times, but due to the nature of her depression, went back. I got frustrated with her a lot, and her priorities, and ... well, those of you who know me know I don't have a lot of empathy with people who don't have strong self-esteem. i get frustrated with their inability to deal, and usually end up avoiding them. But still, I'd occasionally check in on her journal, sometimes leave comments, sometimes be happy that she was on an upswing, sometimes annoyed with her that she was falling back into old patterns, or going into full denial and focussing on stuff tht wasn't about helping her, but avoiding her life. But still. Someone I kept tabs on. I checked her lj a couple of weeks ago, saw she was getting what looked like a new job, which was always good for her until life knocked her for six again, be it illness (physical or mental) or personal stuff.

A couple of days ago? I found out from the flist that she'd committed suicide. It was public record that she'd tried a few times, but it turns out this time she really meant it - waited til the hubby was out of the house, phones unplugged, the whole nine yards. No cry for help. Just an ending because she couldn't keep going.

She believed in reincarnation, so I hope she's done the mayfly thing a few times - no worries, just a bright, beautiful day.

See you around, Olwen.

suicide as socially acceptable

okay, this is a bit of a follow-on from the previous post, but I also have the Rome screensaver at work, so historical context kind of jumped into my head.

I'm wondering when it was that suicide, at least in the UK, became socially unacceptable, the 'coward's way out'. Because from what I've read in the way of celtic legends, roman, greek and egyptian society, suicide used to be seen as the honorable way out, especially in the upper echelons of society. I don't know about saxon/anglo/jute, because pretty much you get exposed to of the Dark Ages history starts at about a century pre-Norman Conquest, and you don't get taught much more than battles/ransom requests/political motivations/taxation. Is it an entirely judeo-christian construct, or a societal construct of post-renaissance/georgian/victorian society?

Any info would be good.

ETA on checking wikipedia, it appears in the fifth century St. Augustine disapproved whole-heartedly of suicide as an extrapolation of 'thou shalt not kill', people took this to extremes, and by 533 you couldn't get a christian burial. Still wondering about saxon/anglo/jute attitudes, since as we all know, they were nasty pagans for a good while. Plus there's vikings. Hmm. I know they practiced ritual self-sacrifice in the Odin cults...

evita soundtrack

In other news, listening to the new Evita soundtrack. It's a more complex score (Lloyd webber re-jigged it to include more Argentinian stuff, and more tango), and the lyrics are different from the ones I'm used to. What's really odd is the fact that it's very, very harsh. The main leads and tone of the singing is very harsh, as are nearly all the strings in this (which are regularly used to punctuate and scrape across your nerves), almost grating in places, and I'm pretty sure it's emphasised for effect, like the way most of Che's is sarcastic as hell and practically snarled, and Eva's accent* comes out here as much heavier than you notice in the theatre. It's a mark of the way she sings that her voice is very, very penetrating and forceful, occasionally grating, but works for the character - either when she's doing the ambition thing or when she's lashing out to justify her actions in the second half. On stage it's fucking fantastic, but if you're just listening to it over the headphones, it's not a comfortable experience. So when you get 'Another Suitcase', which is beautiful, melodic and so on, it's a real shock because you've just got used to listening on the harsh level. Second half gradually becomes less harsh as Evita herself slows down.

Aside from the comfort factor, my main problem with this is that it's all been crammed onto one highlights cd. Would it really have killed them to do a full-length and give full glory to the tango stuff and lesser bits?

If anyone wants a listen, drop a note and I'll stick it up for download.

*Yours truly was raised by Spanish au pairs, so it kind of makes me flashback to childhood, especially the more penetrating accents.

musical pimpage

The Tango Lesson. Beware such things as Sally Potter singing.