I feel lucky these days to be a word person. Even though I miss physical closeness, writing and storytelling have always been important forms of connection for me, too.
When I was a kid, my Aunt Carol would send us letters from Colorado and my family would sit around the kitchen table while my mom read them aloud. My aunt’s letters were newsy and insightful and funny. Reading them gave us a sense of intimacy—different than when we were all together with my cousins in the same room—but just as true.
Books, too, have provided me with a feeling of closeness that is difficult to explain. To this day it is hard to believe that Laura Ingalls Wilder or Beverly Cleary or Mary Oliver or Toni Morrison never knew me. Their writing seems to suggest otherwise. Not because the details of our lives were the same (they weren’t), but because the intimacy of their writing made me feel understood. Known.
Your letters did that for me this week, too, gave me opportunities to connect.
Next week, I plan to write about resources people have found or created to tend to end-of-life matters in the time of coronavirus. Like every other area of life, distancing measures have upended our normal ways of caregiving, mourning, and honoring end-of-life.
I want to share one with you this week that number of friends sent my way, Brene’ Brown’s podcast, Unlocking Us with grief expert David Kessler. Kessler speaks to why story sharing is so often part of our grief process:
Each person’s grief is as unique as their fingerprint. But what everyone has in common is that no matter how they grieve, they share a need for their grief to be witnessed. That doesn’t mean needing someone to try to lessen it or reframe it for them. The need is for someone to be fully present to the magnitude of their loss without trying to point out the silver lining.
Your stories about your loved ones were gifts this week. Thank you. And thank you for bearing witness.
It’s coming up on the 1st Anniversary of my 16-year-old nephew’s death by suicide followed 10 days later by my Auntie’s death of alcoholism. I’m experiencing, in hospice terminology, intense anticipatory grief. The quarantine is making it so much harder because I want to be near my cousins at this time to hug. Grief needs human touch.
Mindy Franssen
I lost my husband at age 52 to cancer and it shattered the nicely constructed future that included retirement, travel, and artistic growth. Every summer, both before Rob died and after, my parents would come from Kansas to visit and stay for a week or so. We would always plan a big pool party with family and friends. Over the years it became a noisy annual bash that we all looked forward to.
Three years after Rob’s death, we had our summer party. As we were gathering dishes and putting things away, I stopped in my tracks and started crying. My tears were triggered by a wonderful and horrible mix of emotions. I was stung by the realization that I hadn’t thought of Rob at all. I hadn’t said to myself “Rob would have loved this. I’m miss him so much”.
The realization that my life was moving on and I was making progress was a GOOD thing. But the realization that I had forgotten him during this event was also devastating. He had been such a big part of it: cooking, socializing, and celebrating. The pain came rushing up, full strength and unbound, a mixture of pride and sorrow. I had reached a turning point, a milestone, in a messy process that still continues, sixteen years later.
Susie Fisher
My Nonie (maternal grandmother) is forever the voice in my head. It is her wisdom I lean on when I don’t know what to do, and if I’m lost or need advice I always think “What would Nonie say?” Since she went home, I have missed her physical presence, but because she was such a big part of my upbringing (she was more a mother to me than my mom – she truly cared and would show up when I needed her) I knew what she would say at any given moment. I don’t necessarily mark the anniversary of her passing, but I honor her and include her at every moment when I need her and her wisdom – thus honoring her beyond the anniversary of her death.
Here are some Nonie sayings that stay with me:
They’ve got the same pants to get glad in that they got mad in.
Let’s not go borrowing trouble from tomorrow.
If I see something I’ve never seen before, I’ll throw my hat at it.
Let’s buy some gum so we can have something to chonk on.
And my favorite:
I love you Hessie Annie – to the moon and back.
Leslie
My mom and dad died five months apart to the day in 2001 in June and November. I was happy my mom missed 9/11 and that my dad was so out of it by then, that he basically missed it too. My mom died of lymphoma and my dad of pancreatic cancer. To this day I miss them both, but especially my mom. I never realized how very much I loved her until she wasn’t here anymore. However, with time, the pain fades and I remember the good times and I smile. I sometimes dream about my parents. In the dream they are much younger than when they died, and it is always a happy occasion.
My mother’s birthday is May 22. My best friend’s mother’s birthday is May 23. She is also deceased. Around the time of their birthday, the two of us always go out for a special lunch honoring our mothers. We have a lovely time together and reminisce for a few hours.
Carol Y
What I remember about July 24, 1956 is walking into our back porch to meet my sister who told me our mother died. I was coming home from my summer job with Pepsi Cola and had just completed my junior year in high school. I do remember thinking that this cannot be. I knew Mom had not been well, but everyone told me she would get better. Times were different in 1956. We did not talk about the possibility of losing one’s mother to cancer.
The following morning, I got up and went to work only to be met by the executive who also was our neighbor. He told me I should go home. No one had told me how to act in that situation, that you didn’t go to work the day after your mom died. The rest of my loss process is a blur, though I know there was a service and gathering at the cemetery.
The part I held onto for a long time was I wish I had told mom how kind she was. Not just to me but to everyone who knew her. How proud I was that she was my mother and her part in making our home a happy place.
Ron Stavoe
The last eight of my 62 years have included many losses. Just as I get to calm water and whoosh, here comes another loss. All along the way there have been loved ones and dear friends by my side. One of my favorite things I heard from a friend years ago and I like to share with others is “God is Fancy.”
I always think of my mom in the spring. She died on the first day of spring and her birthday was May 12, so spring flowers always remind me of her. Irises were one of her favorites. Not long before she died, I transplanted some of my mom’s iris into my yard in Montana.
A few years ago, I went through a very painful divorce. I left Montana and moved back to Boise in the middle of winter. I was heartbroken because the iris bulbs were buried in snow, so I couldn’t take them with me.
Eventually, as I rebuilt my life in Boise, I was able to buy a beautiful little cottage. That first spring when blossoms began to appear, I discovered the house was surrounded by purple iris. God is fancy.
Just yesterday I was out planting some flower seeds and enjoying the daffodils that are growing and the tulips are about to bloom. And I talked with my mom. I told her I wished she could see my beautiful yard and walk around with me and see all the beautiful flowers. And then I thought, silly me, she is right her with me. Alas, the purple iris, I can feel her winking at me.
Teresa Best McDonald
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