Death Dates

Death dates are hard. I don’t call them “Anniversary dates” because I do not celebrate them. Instead, I honor the dead through my grieving. On those dates, when the mighty calendar of time turns, it can feel as if we have stepped outside of our own soul and lost connection with who we are. Then, there are other times when you may feel more connected with yourself, your true being. That is death. That is grief. It can spin you around and in a matter of moments, steal your breath, leave your heart hurting, and suddenly make you smile. It can clench your stomach and make you feel as if you are carrying a hundred bricks on your shoulders, and then while flooding your cheekbones with tears, death will make you grateful for love. 

Grateful for love. Love is that thing we are hopefully born with, as our fresh, rosy faces look up as our mothers hold us. Love is often something we seek throughout our lifetime, and it lifts us up and often takes us to our knees. Love can offer hope and life, and it can wreck you because of love that feels lost. 

To miss someone dear to you is a gift.

To miss them will leave you in anguish at two in the morning. A well worn pillow holds a thousand tears. 

I sat this morning remembering two years ago. I remember watching her fight to breathe through a death rattle that would not let up. I held her hand, hoping that she felt my touch as she lay with her eyes closed. I wanted her to feel safe in her passing. To know that she was not alone, and take my strength and love with her to meet those who would come to collect her soul. There was love in the room that day. Her children and grandchildren, and daughter and son-in-laws are all saying goodbye. There was agony and pain, and a sudden desire to get in my truck and drive to the woods and let out a howl that would scare a pack of wolves. I wanted to run. Run fast and long on a rocky trail with sore knees, and just disappear, but one cannot run from the lingering death and the pain that will follow. You must face it with courage. A son must stand guard above his mother and wait, watching with both eyes as she starts to let go of this life. It’s your last gift to her. To be there and swallow your pain with a dry mouth. 

To feel so helpless brings a great deal of guilt. Death is not within our control. 

There is a moment of light that comes after death. It tells you that at a great height above you, in the midst of heaven, they gained another soul. The heavens adopted another person that will one day wait for me to join them. Then, there is another moment where sanity is lost. It’s where my fist slammed into the earth that I knelt on, wanting to stop the rotating planet beneath me and let it feel my strength and pain. A moment where I stood outside of myself looking down at the little boy I once was, stroking the hair of the man I had become, wondering if my sanity would return or if I have now lost myself for good. 

To lose yourself is sometimes needed. Death will change you, so in a way you are lost.

The loss of a mother is like losing a piece of yourself. A piece that is now broken and can never be put back into place, leaving you changed for the remainder of what time you have left. 

I sometimes wake up in fear. It is in the fogginess of the morning, when I am somewhere between sleep and awakening, and I suddenly panic, wondering who I will lose next? I claw at my eyes, removing the irrational thoughts from my mind so I can begin my day, knowing that death will one day come for us all. It allows the fear to subside. Yet, there are some deaths, that if they come too soon, might take me away from the world I currently know.