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...I have a hard time believing it was depression.
As do I. I've read some comments online, people saying maybe he was depressed but was really good at hiding it. Which just proves they don't know how depression works. Depression – or at least severe to extreme depression, which are the two types that most often lead to suicide – isn't something you can hide. It informs everything you do, your every reaction, your every thought, your every interaction. It's about as easy to hide as a giant tumor in the center of your face, and like a tumor, it's a disease that requires treatment to overcome. If he were that depressed, his family would know it, his friends would know it, and this wouldn't have come as a surprise.
No. More likely, it was a spur of the moment thing. Maybe he'd slipped and started using again; maybe he was feeling drawn to using again due to being back on tour with Soundgarden. There's this thing when you're in addiction recovery, “people, places and things” – triggers you need to avoid if you hope to remain sober. With Cornell, he was using regularly during his Soundgarden days. He's spent most of the time since they disbanded clean. Now they're back together – it's a return to a situation he used to use in. Could be it just acted as a trigger and got him itching to use again.
But it's all conjecture. Unless they find a note or drugs in his system, I doubt they'll ever make any sense of it. As for auto-erotic asphyxiation, also highly doubtful, as those into that kind of thing know the dangers and wouldn't attempt it without having a partner there, just in case. The partner doesn't always prove helpful (look at what happened with David Carradine, the hooker he was with couldn't do shit to help him) but nevertheless.
But again, conjecture. Saddened fans looking for rationale in an irrational act.
