It’s funny how two people might interpret the same thing.
On Valentine’s Day, a fire truck with flashing lights, parked on the street near our apartment. It was obvious to me that they weren’t tending to a bona fide blaze, but had been called out on another matter. As I looked out the window, it dawned on me with some certainty that they were tending to an attempted suicide. There’s an apartment complex just a little bit to the South that houses all sorts of university students, and I imagined one of them, alone in his room. His girlfriend recently broke up with him, and feeling homesick and overwhelmed, both by the big city and being in a university program he couldn’t keep up with, he gave himself over to despair, and attempted to kill himself. He was prone to depression and had difficulty making and maintaining friendships, and he simply couldn’t bear the thought of telling his parents he flunked out of school.
Rachelle, when confronted with the exact same scenario, imagined a young man trying to impress his Valentine’s date by preparing an elaborate dinner, which he then burned. This set off fire alarms throughout the apartment building, bringing forth the fire department. She imagined the couple telling that story at their 60th wedding anniversary, their entire family gathered around.