Vi, isn't it inspiring to experience the light after darkness? I am grateful for the dark time I lived through, though it was hell on earth at the time. I never would have guessed that I would thank God for that period of time. I believe God uses those times to strengthen our compassion and sympathy towards others when they suffer.

Dotsie,

Yes, it's inspiring. I thank God there is a benefit to this form of hell. Otherwise it would be totally unacceptable.

Sometimes I wonder if I hold onto the grief longer than I need to out of loyalty to the one(s)I have lost. Sometimes if I catch myself not thinking about them, I bring thoughts of them back, which, of course, reinforces the loss and the heartache. There are so many variations, so many paths for so many reasons, some of them known to us, some of them not, that grief can take.

Vi

Vi, you mentioned loyalty. Just this morning I was thinking about when was the last time I visited the cemetery. My thought was...I SHOULD get there again soon. Definitely a thought of loyalty. How funny you should mention that.

I agree, that sense of loyalty DOES seem to play a part in extending the grief. I was like that with Dad. I'd feel so guilty after realizing that it had been days (then weeks) since I had last thought of him. But then one day I realized it had to be that way or I'd never heal and never get myself back out of that hellhole.

My grief with Mom is entirely different. It's full of regret and conflict between loyalty to her as the wonderful, generous woman that she was, and the need to know the truth of our relationship. There was serious damage done, but I don't want to face it because it seems disloyal to her. I want to "let those sleeping dogs lie" and just move on because I don't want to sully her memory in any way. And yet, it's like a toothache that your tongue can't keep away from. I want the truth, but not at the expense of damaging my Mom's reputation. But more than anything, I want it not to matter so much so I can just move on.

[ July 20, 2005, 11:32 AM: Message edited by: Eagle Heart ]

Visiting a grave has always made me very sad. For this reason, I've asked to be cremated and just spread my ashes in beautiful TN or...Neiman Marcus Shoe Department. Seriously though, I can't visit graves. I just stand there and cry and I don't want that to happen to my kids when I'm gone.

I have the same problem, Dianne. Or open-casket viewings. Especially of people I love. It breaks my heart to see them lying there like that. I prefer to remember them with vitality and sparkles in their eyes, but after I've seen a body laid out, that's the image that stays in my head. It can take me months to get past that image and back to my memories of what they REALLY looked like when I knew and loved them.

Am I the only one who has trouble getting rid of such vivid images in my head?! Once I've seen a graphic image of something, it takes so much work to get it out of my mind. It keeps replaying itself over and over again, despite every effort to fill my mind with God and flowers and other beautiful thoughts. Which is why I have to be very careful what toxic stuff I put into my brain.

I'm the same way. Things from years ago still haunt me. It's so frustrating. I constantly recall my aunt's passing and have to shove it out of my mind. I have the tendency to self-abuse in this area. Pull up old, dumb things that happened 100 years ago and lament over them. It's just so dumb.

Dotsie and Eagle Heart - thank you for responding regarding my feelings about loyalty. It draws us together, makes each of us feel less isolated on our journey. Eagle Heart, my heart is with your regarding your issues with your mother. The fact that she was so unkind to you, makes it harder to reconcile. I've come to believe that there is nothing more important than kindness.

Seeing someone in a casket used to bother me. I remember when my grandmother died at age 69. I was 16. At the funeral I remember her sister, Lola, touching Grandma's hand, saying, "Oh, Mabel, Mabel" Aunt Lola had tears in her eyes. That was 40 years ago. I've been to so many funerals of close loved ones since. I was with Gary when he took his last breath. Later at the funeral home I needed to be alone with him in the viewing room. I needed to slip my hand inside his shirt and touch his skin, to feel the surgery incision. I needed to infuse this into my mind so I could accept that he was dead, really dead.

I was there an hour after my sister died. She was just laying there on the couch, her mouth hanging open. It was different, but I realized this is how it used to be when there was a death. People came to the family home and viewed the body. I still see her in my mind, it will probably always be with me, but it seems natural to me now. I'm not haunted by it.

I think being with Gary at the end and working all that through changed things dramatically for me. That change is a good one. With the gravesite - Gary was buried in a military cemetery. It was free. After his death I went and sat with him several times. But he wasn't there. It didn't comfort me to be there nor did it bother me. I could as easily talk to him anywhere else.

Maybe the acceptance of the gravesite thing is because my father's family has a family cemetery. The first funerals and burials I attended were at the family cemetery. It was just a small place, no fancy markers. But the last physical remnants of their earthly lives seemed to belong there. My father was not buried there. This does not bother me either. He does not live in a box in the ground. He is free and happy.

I think this culture has changed so much in so many ways so very quickly that we now miss the belonging - that we are part of our ancestors in this way too.

What I learned from a raccoon.

Today the old raccoon, Missy, came again to the back door. When we first met her years ago, she was old, tired-looking, a piece of her ear and part of her tail was missing. No longer the reigning matriarch, she watches nervously now for another raccoon, the one who must have defeated her sometime during the winter. After raccoons attacked our old cat, Fleggy, last fall we stopped feeding them. Missy was not part of the attack force. She and Fleggy got along, respected each other's ways, each other's space. Still to stop the group of over eighteen from coming around and threatening all three of our kitties, we had to stop feeding them. Unfortunately neighbors shoot raccoons around here for robbing chicken houses. When Missy showed up this spring, she looked elderly, no longer agile. Even more of her tail was missing, and she wore the defeat of age. This year for the first time she has no litter. Only last year she was vigilant, watchful, in charge.

This morning my husband, Phil, said, "I think this will be Missy's last year."

I said, "She probably won't make it through the winter."

"She may not even make it through the summer," he said.

Always while she eats now I sit watch for her. Perched in an easy chair back next to the sliding glass door I comb the deck and the hillside to make sure no one comes and attacks her for the food. These days there are only two other adult raccoons who show up. One has three kits, the other has one. Usually after Missy eats she hobbles to her favorite spot behind a small stump next to some ferns, cleans herself and sleeps for a while. Today she curled up on the ramp to the deck, nestling her nose to her feet and tail. Two times she roused herself and ate again, cleaned herself and went back to the ramp to sleep. Eventually she climbed under the deck and wandered away.

Missy movements have slowed down. She is obviously achy. Life is difficult for her now. I thought of how she resembles my 86-year-old mother. My husband and I shop for her food. We and some lovely people from Mom's church clean house for Mom. She sits most days and watches television - whatever is on. Her arthritis hurts too bad for her to do anything else, even with pain killers. The difference between Mom and Missy is that Missy has no pain medication. She does not have a safe place to be. One day soon she will wander off and die, or she will snuggle into her den, go to sleep and not wake up or be attack by another animal and die as a result.

It reminds me of how hard it is for so many on this planet. That the reality, of this place we've come to learn and grow, is that life for all living beings is difficult. For me Missy has become a case in point on how important extending kindness is/will be as the population continues to soar and the competition for resources escalates. Instead of fighting each other, instead of yelling at others on the freeway, instead of rushing to get the last parking place, instead of saying mine, mine, mine, it's important we learn that what happens to one happens to us all. As we reach up and learn the meaning of kindness and extend it - we become. And when death comes, as it did for my sister, as it has for our mothers, our fathers, our lifemates, our children, it becomes a transition into beauty and freedom.

Absolutely beautifully said Vi. Also I had to smile at your story of Missy (reminded me of that cat I told you about in my email...Toby.....).

As for viewings at funerals, I've had one "positive" experience - that with my Dad. He had been sick for so long - gaunt and tired looking...but my last look at him was in his Air Force uniform with his mustache trimmed - so handsome and YOUNGER looking for some reason. When I slipped the yellow rose (his favorite) into his hands I really thought he'd never looked better and THAT's the memory of him I have held onto not the "sick" Dad. Other experiences were not so positive...

Still I remind myself each time that the spirit is no longer there - it's just the shell.....the spirit is FREE at last.

Vi, that was so rich and wise...thank you for sharing that. It's important to remember to put our individual daily lives into perspective...we're truly all in this together. Learning, transitioning, teaching, living, loving, yearning...no one of us is alone in whatever pain or angst we're going through. The ripples of our choices and behaviours ripple out so much further than we can imagine. Which makes kindness a vital key to bridging our differences, which too often foster friction and hatred instead of celebration and respect.

Vi, it has been such an honour to be allowed to companion you on this journey that you've been making in this thread. It has been a rare and enriching experience being here with you.

[ July 21, 2005, 08:12 PM: Message edited by: Eagle Heart ]