He took a couple of aspirin and told my Aunt he was going out on the porch to sit for a spell.
It was an unusually beautiful almost spring-like day in early November, and he sat outside to enjoy it.
A couple hours later my Aunt came out to check on him, and he was dead.
My that is a hard word to write, or to say, when its real.
I did not know my uncle well. I probably couldn't have picked him out in a crowd. In my family we spent more time with my fathers side than my mothers, and when we spent time with my mother's side, it was her other sister that had kids our age. This Aunt is always friendly and warm and funny, but we never spent much time with them, and when we did her husband was rarely there.
So yesterday I learned he would be there no longer. I thought about this, and how death has barely touched my life so far at the age of 45, and was amazed how lucky I am.
I could count on my fingers the number of relatives and friends I've lost, and count on the fingers of one hand the funerals I've attended.
I stopped to get gas and the woman behind the counter said, "Have A Nice Day."
I smiled and said, "If you insist, I think I will."
This small change of the usual banality was something I started doing 30 plus years ago. My grandmother used to complain when people told her, "Have a nice day." She'd grumble back, "Don't you tell me what kind of day to have." I found it hilarious. I didn't want to be that mean, but I loved the idea of turning a banality into something special.
She passed away a good 20 years ago. I was in college. Yet to this day she is with me every time I respond brightly to "Have a nice day". I had forgotten that until this morning.
Like my other Uncle, one I was closer to, one who took night courses not to get his MBA, but because he was interested in philosophy and logic. Today, as I try to logically respond to a Hatrack Poster, or play some logic puzzle, it is my Uncle's influence on me. (Don't get me started on his influence on my appreciation of Vulcans.)
There is my wife's grandfather who's tools call to me in a workroom I use rarely.
There is my step-father-in-law who's house we visit. Its not his house, but he is there in the wood work and the gardens and the worm-works he built.
I have a lot of close relatives who are in poor health. I have friends who are getting old. I have another aunt with cancer who was given two months to live six months ago. I know that death will be dancing around me much more often in the near future.
Yet as those who have touched me move on, I begin to recognize the parts of them they have left within me and my world, and it makes me less sad.
Posts: 1941 | Registered: Feb 2003
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The old adage "We're born alone, we live alone, we die alone" is a lie. Even our inner most private thoughts are formed in words, words we learned from the people who surround us. The influence of those we love and hate not only surrounds us, it is woven into the fabric our being.
Like you, I am in my mid-40s and have been touched surprisingly little by death but I have lost grandparents, parents in-law, an aunt, a friend or two and it is comforting to recognize that the things we shared, words and actions continue on in me.
My grandfather died of cancer in the spring before my wedding. My father remodeled the garden that spring so my sister and I could have wedding receptions there. Grandpa came between his chemotherapy sessions to help build the garden. My father was pouring concrete when he received the call that his father had died. Grandpa's name and the date of his birth and death are carved in the concrete along side the the names of my sister and I and our husbands.
It is strange how in the dance of life (which includes death) joy and sorry can sometimes mix so freely it is hard to tell one from the other.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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posted
A family who lived next door to us fell on hard times. The mother (they're young, early 20s), got caught selling drugs and went to jail. Father took care of the two baby girls, but without his wife's income soon became unable to pay the rent on the house they were renting-to-own, so they moved in July. Just last Thursday he was hit by a car when a dollhouse in the back of his truck fell out and he went to pick it up from the road. He died in the ambulance on the way to the hospital. And now his two little girls have neither mother nor father. A grandmother will be taking them. It struck me that despite living next door to this family for four years that we really didn't know each other beyond the occasional hello and help with a jump-start of a car or loan of a phone. The grass in their yard had grown since they moved away. I mowed it Saturday for them. It seemed like the only thing I could do.
Posts: 315 | Registered: Dec 2005
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posted
Thanks for this thread. Since I lost my father, I've sort of had in mind always in my relationships with other people (and non-human people as well) that we only have a short time to be together here on Earth, so we should cherish the time we have. Though we may meet again worlds and eons hence, we are here together for just a little while. Thanks for the reminder.
This thou perceivest, which makes thy love more strong, To love that well which thou must leave ere long.
Posts: 6246 | Registered: Aug 2004
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posted
I wish I had been touched less by death. Sometimes she is so close I can feel her breath on my cheek.
I wrote a poem about it a long time ago, actually.
I'm not suicidal at all, nor have I been, but I have at times seen death as more of a companion we dance with daily rather than an adversary we fight.
Posts: 15082 | Registered: Jul 2001
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posted
When I almost died twice, it was quite a peaceful and wonderful feeling. The second time I positively did not want to come back and pick up the burden of daily living again. It was so nice to let it go. Even though I hadn't noticed before that it was a struggle really. But even if you have a happy good life, it's still a lot more trouble and effort to be alive than being dead, and I was in that perspective. When I did come back I remember I was thinking that we should not grieve for our dead but rather they should grieve for us.
I know! That sounds so dismal! And yet I'm totally not dismal, you know? I'm the starry-eyed optimist who wants to live to be 25,000, or maybe 75,000. I might change my mind when I get there and want longer. I get so much joy out of like ridiculously tiny things like watching a squirrel pick up a piece of cat chow and munch on it or whatever. Seeing baby raccoons every year. Curled up contented cats purring. Watching flames flicker. Or being chilly outside and coming in and getting warm. So lovely! So delicious! Life is exquisitely enjoyable, I think. So that shows you how nice it must be to be dead.
Posts: 6246 | Registered: Aug 2004
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