He didn’t leave a note, but there was no doubt that the financial burdens Dad had hinted at the previous summer were a constant concern. He had taken on the extra work doing testing at the settlement house, but had performed badly and was fired, evidence that this bright, talented man was no longer quite himself. I’ll never know the whole story, but I believe it was this desperation coupled with a sense of failure that drove Dad to hang himself in the sterile little studio apartment in Midtown where he and I had spent so many nights.
