Flipping through countless Easter pictures of my friends kids on Facebook. Most of the pictures alike; kids searching for eggs, kids with Easter baskets, kids in new Easter outfits. Easter in North America. A random click on a cousin's profile and new pictures. More kids; his nieces along with their parents and grandparents in the traditional "group pose" on vacation in Hawaii. I don't flip through this picture though. I pause on it giving it both my attention and emotions. A mixture of shock, nostalgia and happiness. Maybe it's because I miss the people in the photo. Maybe it's because I'm caught off guard about how much the girls have grown. Maybe it catches my attention because I'm jealous. I would LOVE to vacation with 3 generations of family in Hawaii. Port Clinton in July of this year will just have to do eh Dad? But I'm sure that the photo catches my eye because I have a similar picture downstairs.
Later this summer I'm planning on doing some photojournaling. Preserving the stories behind some family photos. I have a how to book that encourages picking out the photos and spending some time with them. Putting them in a visible spot and really examining the details. So I've started with a random one taken 36 years ago at our summer cabin. It's my uncle, my mom, 2 older cousins and myself. Mom and Uncle T sit in those old aluminum framed lawn chairs with the webbing; the boys and I are in various states of play in front of them. The sun shines in their eyes. My mom is wearing a chenille bathing suit because it is after all 1974. A random picture of every day life, or at least life on vacation. Life on vacation tends to move itself in suspended animation yet go by all too fast. To the little girls in the Hawaii picture it's their Dad and his first Daddy when Daddy was about their age.
Of all the pictures I have to work with I think I chose this one to start photo journaling with because I see just a glimpse of my cousins and myself as we are now in our parents. Like a reflection in shard of mirror. Not in how we physically look like them, but how we are becoming them. Or are they becoming us? Whatever it is for a fleeting second I'm reminded of their humanness. Maybe it's just because they're dead that I usually only think of them as parents. But in this hot summer day picture I'm reminded that they were real people. Parenting was one of their many roles. But in addition to that they were real people. My Mom was a woman who had sex, who missed her Mom and may or may not have loved shopping. (Part of the "deal" of losing a parent at a young age is that you don't get to learn any of these things about them.) As John McCrae said in "Flanders Fields" We are the Dead. Short days ago We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, Loved and were loved... Soldiers, my parents, my hospice patients, my homeless brother; all human; all loved and were loved. Easy to forget, good reminder.
The other reason I chose this picture is because my mom and my uncle are dead. They have been for 15 and 28 years. Cancer took them both. But of course they didn't know that back in 1974 and that's what scares and fascinates me. They had no idea what the future would hold. Susan Sontag said “To take a photograph is to participate in another person's mortality, vulnerability, mutability. Precisely by slicing out this moment and freezing it, all photographs testify to time's relentless melt.”
Their vulnerability scares me because I can relate to it. How many random pictures do I have that some day my kids will look back on and say "that was before............" "If only we had known then what we know now........." Yes I know that all of this should make me vow to live every day to the fullest. All the great country music song stuff like "Live like you were dying." And some day it will. But for now it freaks me out a bit. Honestly I'm afraid of dying young and leaving my kids behind. I know they'll be ok if that should happen. I'm proof of that; I have cousins who are proof of it, I have a step daughter and I'm still in contact with the children of 2 precious friends who died waaaaaaay too young. Knowing that death at a young age can and does happen makes me confront my own mortality. If it could happen to them it could happen to me. “Parents, however old they and we may grow to be, serve among other things to shield us from a sense of our doom. As long as they are around, we can avoid the fact of our mortality; we can still be innocent children.” Jane Howard.
And what if I don't die young? What if I DON'T share the same fate as my mom and uncle? What if I get old? Without a picture of my own mom at 70 then I'll be honest and admit that getting older without her as a road map kind of scares me. As the class of 1990 approaches our "cough" 20th reunion there's a new question on the horizon for the first time; aging. There's a line in another song that says "I still remember when 30 was old." Heck I do too! And honestly I think that 40 is old. But it's gaining on me. I looked up an ailment the other day on line that basically said "well, that's what happens as you approach middle age." MIDDLE AGE? MIDDLE AGE?! Maybe it's my work with hospice that's making me think "when I get old, when I prepare to die I'll do....." How did that question get in my head? It's sort of like 10 years ago going to an endless string of friends weddings and thinking "when I get married I'll............" Or making a birth plan for having babies; this is what I want this is what I don't want.
I've mentioned before "The American Book of Living and Dying" by Groves and Klauser who maintains that the dying are teachers. I'm not at the point with my hospice work or patients where I can say that I've really learned cues on how to live and die well. Yeah obviously I've picked up the belief that hospice is the only way to go, that I want a Do Not Resuscitate order, I want to take my own quilts in and a moving picture frame. But other than that not much yet. Maybe I've been too busy learning the ropes to take the time to be observant but it will come I'm sure. For now the knowledge that I'm mortal and that everyone is human is a start. Loved and were loved..........
Showing posts with label death. Show all posts
Showing posts with label death. Show all posts
Friday, April 23, 2010
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
3rd floor please
The 37 1/2 year old version of me got on an elevator and pressed the button for the third floor today. It was only my second time on in In Patient Unit at the hospice; but it for sure won't be my last time. Today I sat down with a volunteer co-ordinator to discuss my areas of interest in volunteering with hospice and as soon as the paper work comes back I can start. In the mirror of the elevator I caught a glimpse of the 22 year old me, who all those years ago also punched an upward number and headed to a hospice office.
At the time I was on my way to what I know would call an anticipatory grief counsellor. My mom had just been diagnosed with cancer and she was dying fast. It has been said that you don't find hospice, hospice finds you. You could say the same thing about death; nobody goes looking for it, it finds you. Death had made it's customary appearances in my childhood. Lurking in the corners as it often does not really affecting you but just letting you know that it's there. There was the death of a distant grandma, then 2 uncles in the same year none of who's funerals I went to. When I was 16 a favorite friend committed suicide; death rode up boldly to center stage of my life. It was a collective experience, I can't remember the death of M without talking about it in terms of "we." We standing for all my classmates. We lost a friend. And like the rabbits in Watership Down we clung to each other in fear of death personified like they did in fear of The Black Rabbit of Inle. Then as quickly as he had come death slipped away again. His shadow wouldn't sneak up on me until late college.
It was the equivalent of the literary device called foreshadowing; something happened that would give clues about what was to happen. We were doing group presentations for a geography class I think. It was the morning of the presentation and one of my friends in my group didn't show up. It was looooooong before the age of texting and we had no idea where she was. I was frustrated and disappointed. A week later she returned and told us that her Mom had died rather unexpectedly. "Mom's die?" how sad. It was so sad that I went home that night and discussed with my Mom how sad it would be for her to die. A few months later my Mom WAS dead. A few years later my Dad would marry that same friend from college's aunt and we would become step cousins. Foreshadowing........
In my head there's a line or memory of demarcation. A memory that stands as the last normal, stable thing before the world crashed around me. I wonder if every crisis has that? Has the "one moment we were doing X and then the phone rang" moment. One moment I was trying to shut the morning news off and then........... One moment I was arguing with my husband and then.............. One moment we were laughing in the rain and then................ Yeah, the major stuff comes with those moments. So one moment I was registering for summer school at college. Listening to Garth Brook's "Ain't Goin' Down "Til The Sun Comes Up" on a yellow Sony walkman and the next moment my Mom was being diagnosed with cancer and told that she only had 2 months to live.
I was an only child, and while we didn't have a diagnosis then it's clear to me now that I had depression back then. In a move that would change the course of all of our lives my Dad got me an appointment counsellor. Death had found my family. He had us in his cross hairs. Hospice also found us. One of those organizations that you have no idea even exist until you need them and then you're sure glad they're there. 5 years ago my oldest son was medi-vaced to a hospital in another state upon his birth. Ronald McDonald House stepped in and gave us a place to stay. That's another organization that you don't know anything about until you need to.
I don't remember the counsellors name and only some of what we talked about but I remember feeling very relieved when I left one of our sessions. You know how in the movies families gather at the deathbed of a loved one and everyone is happy and close? Here's something you don't see in the movies; sometimes families argue all through a death. Arguments so big doors are slammed. Sometimes old sins are dragged out. Sometimes scape goats are created. Sometimes families fall apart and people leave. My family was one of those. I was the grieving person who wanted to talk about it. Who wanted to know exactly how long my mom had and how the death would happen. I dared to imagine that my life would continue without my Mom and that thought scared me. Yes I was self centered, yes some nights I was more concerned about what I was going to wear to a party than my moms health but that was ok. Hospice told me so. Hospice told me that it was ok to grieve the way I was grieving and that talking about death didn't make it happen. When my Mom died 9 weeks after diagnosis a hospice volunteer met me at the house and she was the only person I let into my room that night. Hospice pulled me through.
Shortly after that my Dad joined the board of directors at hospice. They went on to build a 12 bed free standing hospice house. Both my parents volunteer there regularly as well as for their thrift shop and in other areas. A year ago a childhood friend of mine came to live out his last days in "the house" as we call it. Honestly, that caught me a little off guard. While I know that Vancouver has a children's hospice called Canuck Place, I still equate hospice, or maybe just long term dying with the old. C wasn't old. He couldn't be, his birthday is the day before mine. In my head the house was built so that people like my mom wouldn't have to die in a hospital nor a living room. It wasn't built for extraordinary young men. But I'm sure glad it was there. Last week a friends mom died. She was an amazing lady and although I'm sad that she died I'm thrilled that she died in hospice. It seemed a fitting and dignified end to a life well lead. I miss you Jaquie.........
And so all these years and all these states later my work with hospice begins. I hope that one day years from now someone will say of my bereavement counselling that "she got me through." Comforting from where you have been comforted right? Giving back.......... It's going to be hard I'm sure; but worth it. My current work with doing began today by getting back into an elevator.
At the time I was on my way to what I know would call an anticipatory grief counsellor. My mom had just been diagnosed with cancer and she was dying fast. It has been said that you don't find hospice, hospice finds you. You could say the same thing about death; nobody goes looking for it, it finds you. Death had made it's customary appearances in my childhood. Lurking in the corners as it often does not really affecting you but just letting you know that it's there. There was the death of a distant grandma, then 2 uncles in the same year none of who's funerals I went to. When I was 16 a favorite friend committed suicide; death rode up boldly to center stage of my life. It was a collective experience, I can't remember the death of M without talking about it in terms of "we." We standing for all my classmates. We lost a friend. And like the rabbits in Watership Down we clung to each other in fear of death personified like they did in fear of The Black Rabbit of Inle. Then as quickly as he had come death slipped away again. His shadow wouldn't sneak up on me until late college.
It was the equivalent of the literary device called foreshadowing; something happened that would give clues about what was to happen. We were doing group presentations for a geography class I think. It was the morning of the presentation and one of my friends in my group didn't show up. It was looooooong before the age of texting and we had no idea where she was. I was frustrated and disappointed. A week later she returned and told us that her Mom had died rather unexpectedly. "Mom's die?" how sad. It was so sad that I went home that night and discussed with my Mom how sad it would be for her to die. A few months later my Mom WAS dead. A few years later my Dad would marry that same friend from college's aunt and we would become step cousins. Foreshadowing........
In my head there's a line or memory of demarcation. A memory that stands as the last normal, stable thing before the world crashed around me. I wonder if every crisis has that? Has the "one moment we were doing X and then the phone rang" moment. One moment I was trying to shut the morning news off and then........... One moment I was arguing with my husband and then.............. One moment we were laughing in the rain and then................ Yeah, the major stuff comes with those moments. So one moment I was registering for summer school at college. Listening to Garth Brook's "Ain't Goin' Down "Til The Sun Comes Up" on a yellow Sony walkman and the next moment my Mom was being diagnosed with cancer and told that she only had 2 months to live.
I was an only child, and while we didn't have a diagnosis then it's clear to me now that I had depression back then. In a move that would change the course of all of our lives my Dad got me an appointment counsellor. Death had found my family. He had us in his cross hairs. Hospice also found us. One of those organizations that you have no idea even exist until you need them and then you're sure glad they're there. 5 years ago my oldest son was medi-vaced to a hospital in another state upon his birth. Ronald McDonald House stepped in and gave us a place to stay. That's another organization that you don't know anything about until you need to.
I don't remember the counsellors name and only some of what we talked about but I remember feeling very relieved when I left one of our sessions. You know how in the movies families gather at the deathbed of a loved one and everyone is happy and close? Here's something you don't see in the movies; sometimes families argue all through a death. Arguments so big doors are slammed. Sometimes old sins are dragged out. Sometimes scape goats are created. Sometimes families fall apart and people leave. My family was one of those. I was the grieving person who wanted to talk about it. Who wanted to know exactly how long my mom had and how the death would happen. I dared to imagine that my life would continue without my Mom and that thought scared me. Yes I was self centered, yes some nights I was more concerned about what I was going to wear to a party than my moms health but that was ok. Hospice told me so. Hospice told me that it was ok to grieve the way I was grieving and that talking about death didn't make it happen. When my Mom died 9 weeks after diagnosis a hospice volunteer met me at the house and she was the only person I let into my room that night. Hospice pulled me through.
Shortly after that my Dad joined the board of directors at hospice. They went on to build a 12 bed free standing hospice house. Both my parents volunteer there regularly as well as for their thrift shop and in other areas. A year ago a childhood friend of mine came to live out his last days in "the house" as we call it. Honestly, that caught me a little off guard. While I know that Vancouver has a children's hospice called Canuck Place, I still equate hospice, or maybe just long term dying with the old. C wasn't old. He couldn't be, his birthday is the day before mine. In my head the house was built so that people like my mom wouldn't have to die in a hospital nor a living room. It wasn't built for extraordinary young men. But I'm sure glad it was there. Last week a friends mom died. She was an amazing lady and although I'm sad that she died I'm thrilled that she died in hospice. It seemed a fitting and dignified end to a life well lead. I miss you Jaquie.........
And so all these years and all these states later my work with hospice begins. I hope that one day years from now someone will say of my bereavement counselling that "she got me through." Comforting from where you have been comforted right? Giving back.......... It's going to be hard I'm sure; but worth it. My current work with doing began today by getting back into an elevator.
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