Tuesday, April 30, 2019
The New Raw Earth
1.
Winter 2013
My sister Sarah died on December 26,
2012.
My mother died on February 1, 2013.
These deaths were unexpected and
not. Sarah was diagnosed with breast
cancer in 2003; she passed during its fourth recurrence - her third episode of
brain cancer. She was tired of the pain,
suffering and systemic disruptions of chemotherapy, and chose to enter
hospice. She died with family, at
home. Her first recurrence was
metastasis to her liver, in 2008. This
episode was nearly terminal. After
remission, her husband Paul said that every day with her was bonus time. This aside, Sarah did die suddenly, at most
six weeks after her fifth diagnosis.
We’d become used to her recovery.
There was little preamble to her final, steep decline.
My mother had been in intermittent poor
health for almost a decade: a series of unrelated problems - pulmonary,
cardiac, a broken arm that never reknit properly. These were just the spike events in her
ongoing life, which included back pain, fibromyalgia, macular degeneration and
mild cognitive decline. She thus lived
with suffering. I was never certain if
her mental fading was related to pain or pain medications. In the fall of 2012, an unrepentant bacterial
infection in her right foot resulted in a mid-calf amputation of her right
leg. Her overall vigor and mental
functioning declined rapidly during this period, as she cycled between hospital,
rehab, and the retirement community to which my parents moved in 2010. In hindsight, I believe that she entered the
end-of-life process naturally by mid-November, when her truncated leg developed
a new infection. This trajectory
increased, and like Sarah, she passed at home in the care of hospice.
I live in California, my family is in
Maryland. I was not with Sarah or my
mother when they died, although after both events I was present within 30 hours
at most. I don’t regret this. My last direct memories of Sarah are a family
dinner during a visit in November; we subsequently talked on the phone, or more
frequently, missed connections. I was
traveling for work when she began to decline rapidly; I rue being unable to
reach her during this period. I last saw
my mother when I at Sarah’s Memorial in January. Although she was mostly in the transition
state between this world and whatever is next, we had our moments of
connection. I felt her absolute love
when I told her that Sarah had died.
On what I’ll call energetic, noncorporeal
planes, I am in constant connection with my sister and mother. These relations evolved after their
passings. I felt Sarah move on at the
time of her Memorial, after lingering with us for the several days following
her death. I’ve written about this
elsewhere. Her departure and release
were lovely. I felt my mother shift and
join her much more quickly over a several hour period on the day she died. This was peaceful and gentle. At this point, I feel their distinct energies
with me and supporting me. For example,
I ran a 10k road race in April; at that time this was the edge of my “wise
amount to race” distance. I pushed the
pace as planned, and began to feel my lactate and aerobic thresholds, that is,
began to hurt, at about mile 4.5. I
normally just endure through this, but on this race, I realized I was far from
alone; Sarah and Mom were sort of all around me. Nothing hurt any less, but this support
helped.
I have excellent support systems at
home. My father and I have gotten closer
as we process all this loss and change.
I work regularly with superlative body/mind/spirit therapists. I have friends and colleagues that love and
care for me. I read about loss; I write
about it. I exercise, eat well, and do
other activities that nurture.
When I inventory the range of possible
responses to grief, I am relieved with what I am not feeling. I am not particularly angry or resentful at
the disappearance of loved ones. I know
we all loved each other without condition.
The imperfections of our relationships were neutralized sufficiently as
we all became adults that they now lack much power. I've been living independently for long
enough, and am mature enough that I don't feel like part of my soul has been
riven away.
2.
Spring 2013
Grief persists. I know this should not be odd, but it's
continually surprising. I biked to BART
one morning, waited in the rain, got a seat and read for a while and then
suddenly felt intensely sad. Grief thus
comes when it wants to. These periods
are disorienting. It doesn’t make sense
that I ache so much when consciously I’m doing supportive activities and feel
normal most of the time. I've realized
that these episodes are the fading of numbness after the two closely spaced
deaths.
However, as time passes, I’ve begun to
feel more - and feel worse. Grief has a
texture similar to mild depression. I
wake up some mornings and don’t want to move.
Sometimes this is inchoate; other times it’s incredulity at my
losses. I’ll never see Sarah or my
mother again. It especially makes no
sense that my sister, younger than I, is the one who passed. I had anticipated the remainder of my life
with her in it.
There’s an arrhythmic periodicity to my
feelings. Some days are fine, others are
tough. Currently, the overall trend is
downward; the muffling silent valleys get deeper, the views from the hills are
rarer. I have to ameliorate this to live
my life, augment my usual self-care.
Coffee helps to get me moving; I’m really relying on caffeine for the
first time. Although it's crucial to
stop and be lost in the fog once in a while, I keep moving, whether running,
gardening, working, reading, or improving my house. Motion is better. I trust that my feelings will articulate
eventually.
On the nights when I actually sleep well,
my dreams show this unconscious processing of emotions. This is an alarming relief; these visions are
filled with strange new content rather than the themes I’ve come to know over
five decades. I recently dreamt of
watching a time lapse video showing a year of beach sand migration – onshore in
the summer, offshore in the winter. The
setting was clearly Bali; lots of surfers.
At the end of the video, the pace shifted to real time. Suddenly, a giant rogue wave surged onshore,
breaking at a height of a couple hundred feet onto the coast and washing
uphill. I was transported safely in the
current, ending up with a lot of other survivors amid the ruins of a Balinese
Hindu graveyard. As I walked down
towards the coast to help, I passed bits of broken grave monuments and
disinterred remains. The whole coastline
had been scoured clean; only piles of debris cluttered the beach. I wasn’t scared or in shock, just present and
moving forward. The symbolism here seems
obvious to me; daily life shattered by an anomalous event, the sudden presence
of death and destruction, the necessity of continued living[i].
This demonstrates the
perverse alternate side of grief; it is providing me with rich new
experiences. It is a new unknown country
that I must explore to survive, one that tests my endurance and
integration. A hard part is that it's
not utterly foreign, so I cannot just relax and flow as I have, for example, in
Bali. The new land is an overprint on my
daily life, invisible to my eyes but sensible many other ways. It seems like I’ve shifted one or two
realities away from the original universe, to a new Earth. It’s still a very similar place, but the
basic physics is slightly different, the colors are off and time is a little
warped. This could be the action of new
emotional filters. It’s both interesting
and disturbing.
There are other new experiences. On the night after my mother's Memorial in
April, I had visitations, at minimum some kind of post-dream crossover. I woke up once, and Sarah was standing at the
foot of my bed. Another time, my mother
was at bedside. While these visions persisted
for not more than a minute, I got a sense of renewed connection and peace from
both.
I get some solace from music. Each passing pushed a different piece into my
consciousness. During the time before
Sarah’s Memorial, “Fire and Rain” by James Taylor cycled over and over in my
mind. The 3rd and 4th
movements of Beethoven’s 9th Symphony echoed in the weeks before my
mother’s Memorial. Such different and
surprising music, pieces that I have known for a long time, but which had no
particular prior meaning. Now, I listen
to recordings, and grief relieves for a time.
The six weeks after my mother’s Memorial
have been easier. My father has seemed
unburdened, which helps, and my daily life resumed a somewhat familiar
routine. I felt better; returning to running
after an injury. A GI system cleanse gave me more energy, and my grief stayed
just below the surface. I could touch it
or connect with Mom or Sarah easily, but the fog was thinner.
I anticipated that this period was
impermanent, like everything else. I was
right. During a May taiji class, I was
overcome by the presence of my mother and Sarah. I was particularly grounded at this point, so
I stayed in the form we were practicing, but it was all I could do to keep it
together. This was also the weekend of
my 30th college reunion – I did not go, but heard from friends who
were there and had just learned my family news.
The weather was overcast all weekend.
I don’t know if these were stimulations, but I woke up Monday back in the
foggy valley. Oh well. It was almost familiar this time.
3. Summer 2013
Summer,
heat, long day light: the growth of my garden and its needs – planting,
weeding, harvesting - parallel temporarily expanded job responsibilities. It’s also race season; six events since early
June. Life is fuller and more tiring,
due to the needs of the external.
Grief
remains but has become a net that encloses my energy and abilities. My usual capacities and capabilities are
below “normal” – the new physics of this new earth. I dropped my coffee dependency after the
cleanse in the spring, so the effects of this diminishment are clearer. At the same time, I’m less muddled by
depression: a relief. I wonder what
happens next. My workload will balance,
race season will end and my annual plants will wither. I don’t like this transience, but I want to
honor it, let it evolve on its own.
One
ripple in this current occurred while my father and niece were visiting in
early July. This was a good time of
connection and experience. I learned
that my brother-in-law has a girlfriend.
While surprised, I did not feel any particular judgment about this, but
was still very disturbed. I realized
that this news sent a dart into my spirit.
Sarah and Paul were so bonded that this new connection could only be
undeniable evidence of her passing.
4. Fall 2013
The
long tail of grief; the peaks and valleys spread out in time and even out
somewhat. I wonder how long it will
last: maybe my remaining lifetime.
I
am a pioneer on this new Earth. The
constancy of life is broken. I won’t be
with Sarah or my mother again, benefit from their support, love, and
counsel. It wasn’t supposed to be this
way. I imagined my parents aging and
dying, and going through these transitions with Sarah. But unexpectedly, the family is down to the
men. I’ve become the tip of the spear,
with new responsibilities – increased oversight of my father; holding a
significant chunk of family history. I
also face the prospect of being alone in unexpected ways. The path of Life has changed.
It
has been a fall of too much work: teaching, a temporary supervisory position
plus my actual job. When I have rare
moments of assessment, I find deep exhaustion driven by grief. I function, I succeed, I check off the boxes,
but I am draining. I’m in a deep
tropical valley, fighting my way through heavy vegetation. I can see patches of sunlight and hear a
stream, but my surroundings are constrained and umbral.
This
is another period of many of races: 10ks, half marathons and longer. Diligent training is making me faster, so my
times are often rewarding. I have
relentless needs to stay in condition and improve. The latter means speed and adaptation to pain
in my muscles and lungs. These are
paralleled by building the mental intensity required to manage and endure fast
training runs and races. These
sensations are good parallels to grief.
I don’t run to vent my feelings, but the symbolism is there.
In
early October, I received notice of a 5k race to support Project Pink, a breast
cancer charity in Davis. That night, I
saw NFL and college football on the TVs at my gym. The players were wearing pink accessories in
support of National Breast Cancer Month; I honor them for it. This combination – the race and the pink
uniforms – revived grief. I had found the
stream in my tropical valley and fallen in it.
I have struggled to the bank, and am trying to assess how to dry out and
keep progressing.
Of
course I signed up for the race. I
ordered the last men’s medium pink LiveStrong t-shirt available anywhere, as
far as I can tell. I could not prepare
for the race as usual, reviewing the course and thinking about strategy; it
hurt too much. In the back of my mind, I
kept the idea of setting a personal record for this short distance; the speed
this necessitated would take me to the edge of pain.
Race day; an early drive to Davis
with my friend Sengita. We put on our
pink shirts, got our pink race bibs and pink event t-shirts. We were early; the start area gradually
filled up with runners and walkers: a pink sea.
Sengita pinned a picture of Sarah on the back of my shirt.
The race was inspired by Ann, the founder of
Project Pink, a Davis resident who has been in contention with breast cancer
since 2004. One of her friends noticed
Sarah’s picture and asked about it. This
led to a very inspiring and somewhat teary introduction to Ann. I told her my PR goal. Understanding and connection with her were
immediate. We rooted for her, as she
walked the race, and she for rooted for us as we ran.
This contact shook me up. I ran a warm up mile, hit the portapotties
and got in line at the front of the starting chute; it was pretty clear that
the majority of participants would be slower runners or walkers. The horn sounded, and I put the pedal
down. I ran as fast as muscles and pain
would allow. A fast straightway at the
start, a left turn, and then another left into the Davis bike path system. The course was pretty empty. I was far enough up among the rabbits that I
just looked for the orange cones indicating the turns in the course. I slowly
passed the people who started fast and ran out of gas. I thought about Sarah, I may even have said,
this one’s for you. Mile 1, Mile 2, and
another set of left turns. I kept the pace,
and sprinted the last 400 meters with a woman I had been alternately trailing
and passing for a mile. My time was
23:14:45. Yes, this was a PR, by 36
seconds. I placed 3rd in my
age group, and 24th out of 522 for the event. Sengita set a record too.
5.
Winter 2013
More discontinuities emerge. In the course of life, I have built a
foundation of activities and accomplishments that have come to define my
persona: Aikidoka, geologist, photographer, and educator. I went on a hike recently, and while
ruminating on these historical achievements, I realized that they have lost a
large chunk of their meaning. They are
who I was, what I did, not who I am now: a taiji person, runner, and
writer. The now is more significant, the
burden and meaning of the who-I-have-been has detached. My present and past selves have not
translated well to the new Earth. This
makes the future, the unknowable, seem more open. Ballast is gone.
I fear more loss with this detachment. I haven’t felt much creative urge this year;
what little generative energy I could muster poured into my job. I supposed this is to be expected, as my resources
have focused on the needs of grief and exploration. I worry though that my pleasure in
photography has been detached. I hope
that it is just dormant.
I wondered what I would feel as the anniversary
of Sarah’ passing approached. I was
busy, but life was beginning to slow to a sustainable pace. I was becoming used to the new tones and
colors of the new Earth. I went to
Maryland for Christmas, but returned home the day before the anniversary. The next morning, I felt very low and
lonely. Back to the gray valley. However, I could not discern whether this was
the sadness I often feel at leaving my family, or grief. Of course, it was likely a mixture. This felt oddly reassuring; something else
could make me sad, something familiar.
This sign of continuity signaled the start of a
trend: the beginnings of finding familiar bits of myself again. Somewhat of a return to stability. Not normalcy - the old Earth is gone, there is
only exploring the new world. But it
looks like I’ve brought some tools along.
6.
Spring 2014
I wondered when it would feel like time to end
these entries. It’s axiomatic the
process that I have written about will not stop until I do. A year on seemed an obvious timeframe. However, I was somewhat bemused to feel more
stable when this time window passed. I
assessed my location and tools – the new Earth more familiar now, still far
from being a home, but at least I’d learned some of the rules. So I have kept on; working, racing and
feeling. I thought of pithy endings occasionally,
but they did not feel right.
Then I learned that Ann had passed away. I went to her Memorial today. A bright sunny morning, a large outdoor
gathering. Much pink, much black (I was
wearing both). Ann had lived a very
public life, with impacts that greatly echoed those of Sarah and my
mother. The event moved me deeply. Besides crying and grieving with others, the
testimonies to a life fully-lived, to its love, joy, humor and imperfections
brought moments of transcendence. For a
time, we – from Ann’s dear ones to those of us who met her just once - were all
on the shore of a new Earth together, saying our farewells.
There were profound and important direct
messages in the words spoken at Ann’s Memorial; wisdom I hope to never
forget. I left with a feeling of
continuity.
So there’s no end, there’s only the rest of
life. I have much to explore.
[i] About the setting of this dream: I’ve
been to Balinese Hindu graveyards and even seen a mass cremation. And I know way too much about tsunami.
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