The Intersection of Life & Grief
In the past nine or so days, three friends have had a parent die. All three of these friends come from separate parts of my life and I knew all three parents to some extent: one from college whose mother had attended the bridal shower when I was first married; the second friend a former neighbor with whom we had many parties with and whose parents visited often; and, finally, a friend who with his dad stayed at my house after Thanksgiving one night during their move from Illinois to Arizona.
For most of my life I thought that I had old parents (my dad was 41 when my parents had me and I’m not the youngest child). While a parent can die at any time, I saw a decline in mine, particularly my dad, when I went off to college. It wasn’t until recently that I began to realize how many friends had parents the same age as me.
Still, in many ways I was one of the first to lose a parent, and now to be without both of them. As I think about my three friends and the grief that’s washing over them, I can’t help but also think of how I have learned to cope with it.
I still remember when my paternal grandfather died over Labor Day weekend in 1989, the start of my senior year of high school. As we drove home from the north side of Chicago– where they lived– to our home in the western suburbs, I felt awful. The funeral was over and while I hadn’t been overly close to him, there was still a sense of loss.
And the feeling of what now?
Each loss in my life since– in particular that of my younger sister, my parents, all my grandparents, my dogs (who are like kids to me), and all the other people close to me, has forced me to rethink this each time it happens.
It’s probably the worst part of the grief experience to me, that sense of emptiness after the funeral is finished. Finally, after my mom’s death two years ago I began to understand it better.
There is a time after a person dies that feels as if each of our lives has a divide in them. We have the life with the person, and then there is the life we will have without them physically present. That awful feeling I’m describing is what I have felt as I’m trying to merge the two together, to figure out a way to keep that person in my life, even if they aren’t physically here.
It’s not something that’s easy but because grief is not something we have talked about easily in our lives, it’s also not something which many of us are familiar. I won’t say that it takes time to work through this feeling and close the divide (I have seen many people thirty and forty years following a death and still struggling) but rather it’s a process. We have to feel– which means allowing pain and sadness to overwhelm us– and we have to be open to the ways in which our loved ones are still with us.
There is no one way this works for each of us, we all have unique journeys to travel. But for my friends who I know are relieved their loved ones aren’t suffering anymore, but are still mourning the sadness of losing a parent, I also know that their parents are with them still (and always will be), cheering them on.
My hope is that all three feel that, too.
The Hawaiian Wedding Song
Several months after my dad died in 2006, my mom and I went to the Crate & Barrel store by her house– the house that I grew up in– to buy a new family room rug. As we walked through the store, she suddenly stopped and I looked back to find her standing there with tears in her eyes.
“It’s the song we had our first dance to at our wedding,” she said, of the music playing in the store.
And it was a song I’d never heard of or heard before: “The Hawaiian Wedding Song.” I couldn’t remember any other time in my life where my parents had told me the song they had first danced to at their wedding.
Then I started to cry and as we stood there in the store, both crying, I realized it was my dad telling her it was okay to move forward, to buy a new rug, that he was okay.
She settled on a really nice green rug and her dog Ginger enjoyed it immensely. I believe we had to throw it out before she moved though because it had been peed on too many times by her other (later) dog, Daisy, though.
Mother’s Day was a much-needed quiet day at my house after several weeks of non-stop work. I took occasional peeks at Facebook, glad to see the old photos people posted of their moms, but feeling sad that I didn’t have a mom to celebrate it with (although I have many second moms). Still, it wasn’t a bad day and the sadness didn’t ruin my day. Life is always good.
Greg and I settled in front of the television for several “Mad Men” episodes after dinner. Greg likes to keep the captions on and suddenly “The Hawaiian Wedding Song” flashed across the screen. And began to play.
I know it was my parents, but mostly Mom on this day, telling me it was okay to go on. I know well moving forward doesn’t mean I ever let go of the memories I have. Instead, it means I continue to live life remembering she and my other loved ones are with me, especially on days like Mother’s Day.
But sometimes the signs are nice reminder that I’m not without my mom.
A Mother's Day Message
Friday morning I went out to run errands– the day I typically hit the grocery store and places like Target. Everything was busier than usual when I remembered it was Mother’s Day weekend. At Target, the greeting card aisle was particularly busy; all of it– and the constant commercials on the radio and television about buying gifts for mom– are a reminder that my mom is no longer here.
Her birthday is this coming Thursday, the 12th, marking the end of a two months of death anniversaries, my parents’ anniversary, and their birthdays as well as my younger sister’s birthday. To say I’m a little worn out emotionally is an understatement.
I have tried to make plans on Mother’s Day– one year hosting a brunch for the family and extended family of a group of people close to me– but I am also reminded of Mother’s Days gone by. We always went to my maternal grandparent’s house and it seemed like my mom never had the card ready or a pair of “nylons” that didn’t have a run so we had to make a stop at Osco on our way to the tollway. Mother’s Day meant pie, too. Someone always had to pick up the Poppin’ Fresh (now Baker’s Square) pies to make sure there was enough for everyone.
My life is good, it really is, and I do focus on the good, on knowing they are with me. But it’s sad at times and the constant reminding– although materialism at its best– leaves me feeling somewhat empty.
Friday night we had a booth for my Chelle Summer bags at the Girls Night Out Event that benefitted the local Ronald McDonald House. On my left wrist I wore a bracelet of my grandmother’s that my mom gave me and on the right I wore one of my mom’s funky sixties bracelets. Tomorrow will be a quiet day at my house, filled with some much needed rest, but Friday night I honored both my mom and my grandma by taking them with me as I took Chelle Summer public in a new way for the first time.
That’s my Mother’s Day this year.
Focusing on Ourselves
When I was running competitively, I always remember how we were constantly told not to look back at the person behind us. We weren’t supposed to be worried about how close or far behind us they were because that meant we weren’t focused on looking ahead to the finish, to passing the person(s) in front of us.
How true this is for life: how much time do we spend thinking about what other people are doing? Of course this is made easier by social media where we are sharing more of our lives in ways we obviously weren’t doing when I was in junior high (it was a big deal to have an answering machine then and how primitive that seems now). But it’s easy to get wrapped up in other people’s lives. We look at what they have, what we don’t. We think about the good times they are having while we are struggling with something.
What’s the point? If we took all that time that we spent thinking about what others are doing, we’ll realize how much time we’ve lost being productive in our lives, spending time with our loved ones.
We all know that life is short and if those thoughts aren’t helping us move forward, then let the thoughts go and replace them with what inspires you and you’ll see how much you gain by making that change.
