Quote of the Week

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"The worst part of holding the memories is not the pain. It's the loneliness of it. Memories need to be shared."

 -- Lois Lowry

Post Secret Sunday: Cliches that hurt

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Sometimes the best thing to say is nothing. Sometimes it is best to not fight against the loss for words. Better to allow yourself to be enveloped in silence.


When my dad died people would say, "he's in a better place" or "at least he's no longer suffering." Others would say, "it's in God's plans." They meant well, of course, but these are not necessarily the best words to say to someone who is grieving. 


Death and loss are natural--a part in this circle we call life--but they are also ugly and visceral. They leave scars that become more hardened and angry the deeper you delve.


Sometimes there's no reason and no better place. Sometimes there's just an emptiness. Sometimes giving reason to something that just is diminishes it. 


To women who've gone through a miscarriage and to the women who will go through a miscarriage, I say: rage, cry, scream. Let it out. Trying to suppress all these primal emotions is like saying that the loss you experienced doesn't matter...that the person you lost doesn't matter. Sometimes you have to unleash a river of ugliness and anger to give voice to the beauty you once had.

Entropy

In between yesterday and tomorrow--      
today, mo chroi--
With those jagged, vertical lines
You made your choice
Without struggle, irreversible, final.
Tell me, beloved:
Was it nothingness you sought,
Or elusive relief, perhaps
Unreachable it seemed?

Merciful God, they claim, deems you a sinner.
Prodigal son, Bedouin without a tribe.
Locked out of Valhalla
Shackled now to Hades eternal. 

'Coward, you are,' Oh how mere mortals judge,
'Brought shame and dishonour
  to your God
     your country
        your family
           your friends.'
Their forked tongues seethe with righteous indignation,
     eyes of steel

          lips in perpetual sneer. 



But you fought, beloved-- 
Oh how you fought
     and raged
          and thrashed
against the quicksand
     in the darkness
          and in silence!
They never knew,
     and I...

          I saw much too late. 

In between today and tomorrow--
forever, mo chroi--
I shall carry this,
    peeking out behind the clouds: 
      beloved, yes--I meant to say. 

Janis Ian, "When Angels Cry"

Wait Your tired arms must rest
Let this moment pass
Wait until the morning
Close your eyes and you will see
who you used to be
left without a warning
Who knew one so big could grow so small
Lighter than the writing on the wall

When angels cry, can I stand by

When stones weep, can my heart sleep

Wish I'd never heard, wish I'd never heard

Wish I'd never heard

the power of a four letter word

'Cause only love will matter in the end
for a woman or a man
What's the difference now
Here we live with bottles
and needles and truth
Here is your living proof
that death cannot be proud
Some say it's a judgement on us all
I can't believe that God could be that small

When angels cry, can I stand by

When stones weep, can my heart sleep

Wish I'd never heard, wish I'd never heard

Wish I'd never heard

the power of a four letter word

If ever was a rose that longed to bloom

If ever was a heart that longed to fly

If ever was an angel, it was you

So close your eyes and say goodbye

Goodbye

When angels cry, I can't stand by
When stones weep, I can't sleep
Guess I've finally learned
Guess I've finally learned
Yes, I've finally learned
that love is just a four letter word
Hope is just a four letter word

Have you ever held someone as they lay dying?

I have.  

It has been seven years, and still this memory shimmers at the edges—a standout—and it has since coloured and broken me into a million different mosaic pieces that tell a story only I can fully understand. It is my momma's and my shared memory, and people we know have lived snippets of it with us, and yet the colours and the jagged edges are mine alone to sift through. To make sense with.

November 13th, 2002. Aloha Nursing and Rehab Center. Kane'ohe, Hawai'i. Another time, another place, another life.

I crawled into my da’s narrow hospital bed—tubes be damned—and tucked myself into a fetal position, my ears pressed to his chest, listening to the ragged breaths that I knew would soon fade into nothingness.

“Everything will be okay, daddy. You can let go now. You don’t have to hold on for us anymore.” I said these words even as I wanted to scream and beg for him to fight harder to stay with us. It was 10:20 PM, long after visiting hours had passed. My momma said, and I will never forget, "Hold on, Ron. Wait for us in the morning." But it wasn't about our wants anymore--my momma's and mine--but rather, about what a tired man needed. I looked at my watch as I stood in the doorway of da's room. 10:37 P.M., it declared.  

I dreamt of him that night. My daddy and I danced, bathed in an ethereal white glow. Spin me around, daddy! Spin me around more! I was his darlin' little princess again. Safe in his outstretched hands, I spun around and around, happy to see my da. But then the music stopped and the world, as it had before, became a blur of jumbled backgrounds. I turned to see my da, wanting an explanation, but then, like world, he slowly faded away.
 

“No, daddy! Don’t go! Don’t leave me again!” I stopped dancing, held out my hand to hold onto him, to finish my dream, the place where I could always see him, but then he was gone.

I awoke to silence and knew. Just knew. He was gone. I woke up my momma and told her softly, "Momma, the phone is going to ring, and it will be the doctor or the nurses, telling us that daddy is gone." Half-asleep, momma looked at me and said, "How do you know this? No, no...It cannot be. Your daddy cannot leave us. He..." Before she could even finish the sentence, the phone rang.

My daddy died at exactly 1:17 AM. 

People always tell me that I have the memory of an elephant. Professors have commented that I have a photographic memory. "I wish I had that," one of my mentors said. "It would make life easier!" Well, if I could, I would  give this gift of vivid memories to him. Memories are a double-edged sword. Some memories I am so grateful to have, while there are some I wish I didn't remember so vividly. There are little details in everyday life--seemingly innocuous--that can bring it all back. Triggers, they call it. A song, a word, a scent, a sound. They wield so much power over me sometimes, and I bend. Kneel.  They can send me into a tailspin...down, down, down into a spiral of anger, resentment, and a pain of loss so unbearably sharp I cannot find the words to express. Nobody understands.
June, November, and December are particularly difficult months. Right around Fathers’ Day, I tend to withdraw from the world as I half-drown in a strong current of sadness and anger that my father is gone. He died on November 14th, 3 days after Veterans’ Day and a full two weeks before Thanksgiving. A month and two days before what would’ve been his 65th birthday. Right before Christmas, his favourite holiday. New Year dawned without him in 2003, just as it had from then on and will from hereon after. 

In my dark moments I rage and I scream. Silently. In my head, in my room. Intellectually I know that a vegetative body ravaged by diabetes, stroke, and multi-organ failure cannot possibly endure forever. 18 months was a courageous fight. A miracle. Spiritually, I understand the impermanence of life and the enlightenment of letting go of that which are not ours to keep. And yet the child in me--an eternal half-orphan--sees neither reason or life's cyclical nature: I feel abandoned. Betrayed. How could've my Hawaiian Superman succumbed to the Kryptonite of illness? Wasn't my da the invincible wounded soldier who survived two tours of duty in Viet Nam? What happened to the immortal man who defied two cardiac arrests, a quadruple bypass surgery, and a pacemaker? 

I graduated at the top of my class from a university he had also been accepted to. On a drizzling June afternoon, I stood in front of a podium and spoke to my graduating class about persevering and finding one's worth. My momma cried, especially since I didn't tell her about what I--we--had achieved against all odds. How, despite losing the luxuries and comforts from our old life, nothing could take away what is within us. Da should have been there too, because more than anyone, it was he who gave wings to my intellectual curiosity and pushed me to ascend to the pinnacle of my limitless potential. Everyone tells me that of course he would've been proud of the woman that I am today, but how could I possibly begin to explain these unnamed feelings inside me, this guilt because the sound of his voice saying"I'm proud of you, darlin' " is slowly fading away? 

Sei Morto*

Ma io sono vivo,
una barca
piccola
perdita
in un mare 
in tempesta chiamato dolore


Sei morto, sei morto
Ma io sono vivo
Sei morto, ma io sono vivo
Sono morto con lei






*Italian is obviously not my first language--nor am I fluent in it. It is, however, one of the many languages my father spoke, hence the effort. 


**I am much better at translating from Italian to English. 

Hospital Scene 2002

Standing by the window

I could see the city lights in the distance

Cars of various shapes and sizes line the streets

There are people down below,

Laughing and carrying on without a care in the world

I step away from the window

And I turn around

My da's lying on the hospital bed

Still as can be

A machine breathes for him

A tube through his stomach gives him food

The room is stark cold, and I shiver

But my mum doesn't even notice

Her eyes are glued to the heart monitor

Some people in lab coats come

To take his blood sugar, they say

I ask them about his glucose levels

And they say, "He's okay"

"No!" I want to scream

I want to chase them in the hallway and yell

Make them see

How can my da be okay

When they say he can't ever breathe on his own?

When they say he won't ever speak?

When they say he won't ever walk?

"No, he's not okay!" was what I wanted to scream

But I just stood there

Quietly watching their retreating backs

I walk back to the window

And look below

I used to be one of those carefree people

Milling about in the streets

And now I'm up here

So close, but so far

Go figure