What would I tell my friend John if visiting him this afternoon? That the winter skeleton of my tulip tree started to erupt into bloom, the cups of its flowers so promising, so inviting…
In the 12 months from January 2016 to beginning of 2017, I experienced the deaths of the three most important people in my life. My mother first, my husband 9 months after that, and three months later my colleague John Knoop. The three strong pillars of my life were gone by January 12th when I found this closest friend and confidant dead in his bed. He was 77. I have not yet spoken of him in this blog.
John was the best listener I have ever encountered – ever. After a bicycle accident that almost killed him, he stoically made the best of loss of full motion in his legs and hands for the next 20 years. But you would not have known any of this when sitting with him and sharing a few sips of Mezcal. John and I would talk for hours, always interested in each other’s perspectives on politics, the arts, and history. We’d share a poem by Stanley Kunitz, compare G.W. Sebald’s novels. I’d bring “Within Four Walls: The Correspondence between Hannah Arendt and Heinrich Blücher, 1936-1968” and we’d read it together aloud. We made films together, too. There is so much to say about John, his exquisite eye, his utterly fascinating life and work. JohnKnoop.com I will share more, as I have now broken the silence :) on this dearest friend of all.
Since being in my thirties – a time of losing so many friends, students, and colleagues to AIDS in San Francisco – I have been always eager to speak about dead loved ones, saying their names, telling snippets about them, sharing appreciation of them. It keeps the fragrance of each unique person alive; it makes their spirit smile when remembered fondly. They are my ancestors.
Rarely, if ever have I known someone who embraces loss the way you do. The tulip from the "winter skeleton"
ReplyDeleteagainst the blue sky...You bear the flower so beautifully for all to see.
We lost my grandmother yesterday, Ved Kumari Pahwa. I called her Naani - she is my mother's mother. She was born in 1942 in pre-partition Punjab, now part of Pakistan. Karina asked me what I remember of her and that question sparked a conversation with my mom and dad, with lots of laughter. My dad shared a funny story about how my Naani believed that babies should get lots of sunlight, so when I was a baby she would sit me so that I was looking directly into the sun and I would just sit there and squint for hours... Sunlight remains my #1 priority when choosing a room to rent.
ReplyDeleteI don't have too many memories of my Naani because I have lived most of my life on the other side of the world from her. But I have some. When together in Delhi, she would insist on taking me shopping and that was how I learned about all of the color and spice of North Indian life. She had an incredible laugh, and an enormously powerful sneeze that always made me giggle, which I seem to have inherited. When she would come to visit my parents' house in Boston, she would bring with her the smell of North India - the smell of sweat and cumin - and it would linger in the house for months.
My Naani (and my grandfather, Naanu) were my primary connections to that old world where people were born in the same place as their parents, and their grandparents, and their great grandparents, etc. A few years ago, I began studying the Punjabi language to help me better remember that world. Both of my mom's parents and their extensive families were from Multan. I have never been... it is difficult to get there these days with an Indian passport, but perhaps with an American passport, some language study, and some long-distance relationship building, it will be possible...
To honor these memories and desires, I wear a gold bangle, which is the only piece of jewelry I wear besides earrings. It is my Naani's bangle and I have worn this for at least seven years, barely ever taking it off. Although I am light-skinned and I speak English, this bangle gives me away to all of the aunties in the Bay Area... they often approach me in supermarkets and other public places, speaking to me in Hindi with their eyes on my Naani's bangle...
Thank you Karina for your encouragement to embrace death,
Thank you Naani for your laughter, and for introducing me to Sunlight :)
-Aysha
Absolutely rich and life affirming these memories, thank you, Aysha!!! I fell in love with your Naani, may she have a good transition, i am sending prayers... And her spirit lives on through you here with us. May your heart's desires come about in their own time and ways! Big hug and much love, Karina PS: e-mail me a still of her!
ReplyDeleteit is always a joy to listen to stories, memories & adventures with John. I & others have the honor of getting to know incredible people, long after they are no longer physically here, through these reflections you share.
ReplyDeletewhenever you mention losing many friends & loved ones to the AIDS epidemic, I still often feel a little shaken. I can’t imagine the incredible grief, the depth of it, across communities at that time…even writing this as we begin year 3 of the COVID-19 pandemic, the AIDS epidemic seems to have distinct feelings of collective sadness, loss, & heartbreak I can only, barely, imagine…
affirms again the need for elders to share these stories so they are not forgotten, so younger generations can learn, empathize, understand, remember...it helps us know how to navigate the present & prepare, dream, or vision for the future.