Lee Stockdale | Reading

This program is geared towards adult audiences and features the poetry and life story of Lee Stockdale.

Lee Stockdale dropped out of college and got into therapy where he learned or intuited that he didn’t have to kill himself. Shortly thereafter, while driving a cab in NYC, he picked up Jackie Kennedy who was very sweet and told Lee he looked just like his father. That chance meeting with Jackie Kennedy altered his life. He went back to college, then joined the Army where he rose up the ranks from enlisted Military Policeman to Command Judge Advocate, US Army Human Resources Command. Gorilla is Lee’s book of poems describing his journey as a suicide survivor. If that sounds grim, he hopes the book shows an upward spiritual trajectory. Lee’s father, Grant Stockdale, was a close friend of John F. Kennedy’s. They met in Washington in the 1940s. His father was, among other things, JFK’s Ambassador to Ireland, so Lee lived part of his childhood in Ireland. A week after the assassination, Lee’s father, overcome with grief, jumped out the window of his office building and killed himself. Lee was eleven and thought he had to kill himself, too, since his father had, “And everyone said I was just like him.” We are highlighting these stories as part of National Suicide Prevention Month. This program will have suicide prevention counselors in attendance. CONTENT WARNING: DISCUSSION OF SUICIDE.

Pack Memorial Library, Ford Auditorium, 67 Haywood Street, Asheville, NC