Grief

I wish I had something smart to say about dying.  A really good man passed on Wednesday – leaving a stunned and saddened family that wasn’t finished needing him: a wife that has loved him since she was a child; adult children who counted on his support and guidance; grandchildren to whom he rated somewhere between Santa Claus and Jesus; a great grandchild who will miss knowing him altogether, except through the stories that will inevitably become myths.  In the end, his importance to those people didn’t matter – it never does.  We all die, and it is always too soon.

I talked to her this afternoon; the wife-become-widow just beginning the redefining of her own life.  No self pity here.  No drama.  She laughs at the inconguencies of letting him leave her; his taciturn nature becoming playful and even funny as he bore the pain and indignity, still uncomplaining.  The rugged, silent man she had lived with for decades, forever stoic and uncompromising, now charmed his nurses as he lay dying; cracked jokes; socialized.  And she is cherishing that time, when he surprised them all.  He lived life by his own rules and he left life the same way, his way. 

The house he built her is full now, of children and phones and long-absent friends like me, clamoring to soothe our own grief with some small service.  Please – what can I do?  But today’s commotion only masks the changes.  Soon, the phones will stop and the rest of us will move on.  She will hear a new silence, not his silence, not comfortable and secure like it was before.  And she will begin the struggle to make sense of the almost-familiar world around her as it wobbles and swerves; looking for new equilibrium. 

In calligraphy and suitably subdued colors, my condolences look silly and empty, even if I pay extra for delicate embossing in mother-of-pearl.  My awkwardness frustrates me; nothing I can think of is adequate to express my sorrow.  And nothing I can do will help her face this new and unwelcome reality.  How have we omitted this one monumental function of culture?  Every joyous new arrival sets in place an inevitable departure, and yet we have not mastered saying goodbye.  So we will fumble along, trusting Hallmark and casseroles to convey our emotions: loss, love, shock, helplessness. 

What we really mean is Dammit!  This SUCKS!!