Since then, the people of Ireland have taken this event and cause and grown it into perhaps what is one of the most successful charity events that has ever been. In a solemn display of solidarity, every May, hundreds of thousands of people, from Dublin to Dubai and from Tipperary to Taiwan, turn up at 4am in the morning to make a united stand against suicide. This year there were over 100 venues around the world.
Like everyone, I have had proud moments in my life. Graduating from college, representing Ireland in sport, however, being involved and starting Darkness Into Light with Pieta House and my fellow committee members, has definitely given me the most joy. Knowing this year if successful with blackbox I would miss the event, made our success with the programmes somewhat bittersweet.
A few days before I was to inform my fellow committee members that I would be missing DIL, in yet another twist of fate, it was announced that this year, San Francisco would hold its very first Darkness Into Light which would take place at the iconic Golden Gate Bridge.
Of course the dots connected yet again. Darkness Into Light San Francisco would take place May 7th. I would start blackbox on May 8th, and then on May 21st I would fly to Nashville to begin the Digital Health Exchange. Somehow all of these events lined up perfectly, one after the other.
San Francisco
On May 5th, I flew to San Francisco. The morning of May 7th, I got an Uber to the Golden Gate Bridge Visitors Centre. I was early and got there before everyone arrived. Standing there looking out over the bay, the enormity of the occasion overwhelmed me. How had all the stars aligned to make it possible for me to be there on this momentous morning? As Steve Jobs said, you can’t connect the dots going forward, you can only connect them going back. In that moment, every decision I had made, no matter how hard or crazy it seemed to many, somehow made this trip and this moment possible. More importantly, this moment somehow made all those decisions that had come before it, make sense.