The last year or so has been eye-opening. I'm sure you're familiar with the expression, "When it rains, it pours." I found myself uttering these words quite a bit when it came to the foundering health of too many around me; especially that of those who'd gotten on in years. I know, I know - it's expected of the elderly - I mean, we can't live forever, right?
So, bearing witness to one health crisis after another really struck a nerve for me. And damn if I didn't finally realize that we are mortal beings, we do get sick (sometimes very sick) and we eventually die. Game over.
I'm not one to turn back and relish the past. I'm grateful for the good memories and times I've had and glad that I could learn a thing or two from the not-so-good. But lately, I've sort of been craving that old feeling of being invincible. I see kids in their 20s and I can pretty much guess that their biggest concerns revolve around how good they look and who they're going to go out with on Saturday night. I'm not saying they don't have other thoughts or that their lives aren't complicated; they're just enveloped in this wonderful bubble of resilience that guides their thoughts away from the notion that we're all headed in the same direction.
I miss that. I miss the "not knowing" how things are going to play out. My internal editor would like to point out that, at 42, there's still a lot in life (and by life, I mean death) of which I'm still blissfully unaware. I'm sure my perspective will continue to broaden as I age - if all goes well, that is - but plan to fight it every step of the way. I wish I could say I'm prepared to age graciously, but no.
Our society has no love for the elderly. There's nothing you can do to stop them from aging, so why bother, right? Let's just pretend that they don't exist so that we don't have to have the terrifying reality of our inevitable fate rammed down our throats.
Funny how easy it is to put that, the only certainty in our otherwise convoluted lives, so far outside the realms of our comprehension that we can't possibly even grasp it. I love that about us. I miss that feeling. I want to not to think about death anymore, but it's been so prevalent lately that I sometimes wonder if I've passed the point of no return; the layover in Denial Land is no longer an option.
I'm still processing my grandmother's passing, of course. I'm only now getting to the point where I can wake up in the middle of the night and not see her dying right before my eyes. Taking those last few breaths. Disappearing to wherever it is people go when they are no longer a part of our world. It was enough of a shock to my senses that I fear I will never be the same again. Watching her die was a blessing and a curse and I'm still trying to figure out a way to reconcile the two.
So, really, when I sat down to write this post, I was going to talk about something entirely different. Funny how that happens. In fact, now that I reflect on it, it's possible that I haven't been blogging because I still haven't purged all of the "stuff" that's still clouding my brain following my grandmother's death.
How do people go on? I know - they just do. But do they really? My grandmother had the remarkable ability to function wholly after burying a loved one. That's not to say she wasn't impacted or sad, but she was able to move ahead. She never, and I mean never, lived in the past. She really lived each day as it came. Though she did worry. Crazy amounts of worry. "I'm worried about..." "Do I need to worry about...?" "I couldn't sleep last night because I was worried about..." She was worried even as death was gathering her up. Worry was my grandmother's Kryptonite.
I'm not really sure how to tie this one up. I'm still a bit lost in thought - ruminating on the profundities of death. I didn't intend to be maudlin - so I'll continue this bit of internal dialogue offline and perhaps come back to it here later on...
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