having the last words with a man

ROSEMARY · Post by **ROSEMARY** » Tue Aug 06, 2002 5:13 pm

on sunday i saw a small fire in my neighborhood on 15th ave e. i approached the scene because my friends are painting a huge apartment building behind the qfc. i have known these guys for 10 years so the entire summer has been filled with luch breaks, toke hits and happy hours since we work so close. i was concerned this fire was the apartment building. i proceeded to run behind the qfc and thru the alley, turn the corner to find one of my friends, robert on fire and electrocuted. fire was coming out of his ears , mouth, smoke from his eyelids , his hair synged into curly knots, blackened, his face whitish gray with a dead purple hue. he had fallen five stories after hitting a power line. the wire had caught around his foot leaving it like no burn i had ever witnessed. three others were there with me fire extinguishing his burned body. he was conscious so i talked to him because no one knew him and people were polarized with fear. i told him it would be okay and kept repeating this. he talked to me and said something like okay, okay.
the boom lift proceeded to catch on fire so i had to leave his body. there was nothing i could do. a woman touched him and received a 2nd degree burn. finally, the ambulance came and he died in the ambulance.
i am left in shock and have not been able to function at all. yesterday i went to help clean up the signs of his burned body on the pavement and placed some flowers. i have the fire extinguisher key and a horrible memory of his face after 26,000 volts went through his body. i will definitely not be the same after this.
i wish i could have helped him. i wish so many things.
goodbye robert. you death was not in vain.

Post by **Sloth** » Tue Aug 06, 2002 5:57 pm

I hope this is a joke. If this really happened then you have my deepest sympathies.

How did your friend fall and hit an electrical wire?

martino · Post by **martino** » Tue Aug 06, 2002 6:23 pm

i think it's pretty fucking far from a joke.

horrible, horrible business. what you have witnessed rosie is surely far more terrible than anything i would wish on my worst enemy.

i hope you have a shoulder to cry on, rosie. and even if you do -- if i were in your position i would seek out a specialist for post-traumatic stress counselling.

in the mean time you have my most earnestly felt sympathy. i mean it, even if the words don't come out right.

Post by **mccutcheon** » Tue Aug 06, 2002 9:24 pm

I know this happened, a block from where I live. It put out the electricity for most of Captial Hill. I'm deeply sorry Rosie.

<rosie> · Post by **<rosie>** » Wed Aug 07, 2002 8:27 pm

it happened and i can't shake it. i wake up sweaty and terrified. yesterday i helped my friends clean up the site.i washed the remaining mark of his burned body off the sidewalk with a hose. people have put flowers down and my friends have been wonderful support to me.
sloth- he was in a boom lift that hit a power line,when he fell the cord touched his leg and stuck to it. the boom then caught on fire as well as he.
the lesson i have learned is to never be scared to speak to a dying man no matter how panicked you feel.

Post by **Sloth** » Thu Aug 08, 2002 3:28 pm

That post is the most horrfying thing I have ever read including anything by Clive Barker and Stephen King. I am never going near a live wire. That is the lesson I learned.

martino · Post by **martino** » Fri Aug 09, 2002 7:26 am

it's the horror behind everyday tragedies that gets me.

but some people still ask: why do people drink to numb their feelings? why doesn't everybody have a vivid imagination?

"Painter in crane killed after hitting power line
SEATTLE — A man painting a building yesterday in the Capitol Hill neighborhood fell to his death after the crane in which he was riding touched a 26,000-volt power line, the Seattle Fire Department said.

The man was painting an apartment building at 15th Avenue East and East Harrison Street when the boom connected to the basket in which he was standing hit the power line.

A surge of electricity threw the man about 40 feet to the pavement below, a Fire Department spokeswoman said. He was pronounced dead at Harborview Medical Center. Power to 3,800 customers was interrupted temporarily."

Laura-Marie · Post by **Laura-Marie** » Fri Aug 09, 2002 7:46 am

I dont know you from Adam but after loosing a dear friend recently I sypmathise with you deeply and I send my thoughts to you. I hope you find a way to deal with this in your own time and way.
Love to you Rosie.

<rosie> · Post by **<rosie>** » Sat Aug 10, 2002 8:30 pm

i really appreciate everyone's support. certain things trigger the trauma of what i witnessed.i take flowers to the scene daily . i pray for the day i can barely remember his suffering.

Maverick · Post by **Maverick** » Sun Aug 11, 2002 1:07 am

It's truly a sad thing when anyone's life is suddenly and violently cut short, and much worse when it is someone you know and have spent happy times with. I can hardly imagine what you are going through, rosie, but I hope that the fact that you had the strength to comfort him in his last minutes means you have the strength to come through such a difficult situation with your sensitivity intact. From what I know of you, you are a deeply emotional person who is passionate about life...I hope this experience doesn't dim that passion. My thoughts go out to to you, and to the family and friends of the man who died...

<rosie> · Post by **<rosie>** » Fri Aug 16, 2002 5:22 pm

his flowers are still there. my friends will continue the job with osha mentors. i have been wishing i was the one who died. oh i know how pathetic that sounds, but i am the one who is completely detached. my family never calls, friends are sparing with calls. i have no children. besides i want to go. it is not fucking fair. i hope these destitute feelings are part of trauma. so many things remind me of his burning head.

<velvet ring> · Post by **<velvet ring>** » Mon Aug 19, 2002 7:50 am

A few months ago, a stranger woke me up from the road. I had gotten drunk with my spade friend, and then I rode to Steak Ã¢â‚¬Ëœn' Shake for a hamburger sandwich and onion rings. The spade almost ran me over, but the reflectors off my bike stopped him. He told me that I was snoring, when he found me. I told him that he saved my life, but I have been in much more precarious situations since.

Post by **Sloth** » Mon Aug 19, 2002 8:14 am

Spade friend? What the fuck does that mean? Black? Humphrey Bogart?

Also its not a tragedy (like electrocution) if you get run over while you are drunk... its stupidity.

(Ttrust me I know about stupidity. After all I'm about to get married in like 30 days)

Laura-Marie · Post by **Laura-Marie** » Mon Aug 19, 2002 6:18 pm

good luck with the marriage. I nearly did it once but hey gretna green was not my ideal way of getting married neither was being only 20 and forced.
You will have to let us know how it went.

paradoxiq · Post by **paradoxiq** » Tue Aug 20, 2002 12:42 am

Holy shit, Rosie. My god, I'm so sorry you had to see that. Pardon a minor freak-out on my end, but are you talking about Robert from the Hopvine? Robert, aka, let's-discuss-the-nature-of-all-that-is Robert? Robert that I used to share pints with before leaving town? Man oh man ... so sorry, Rosie.