Remembering

A few days ago, I remembered the 1989 earthquake from 33 years ago. Before that my friend Alex, who died from a sudden heart attack two years ago, only 34 years old. Today I commemorate my late husband’s death on October 20, 2016 and the years of increased caring for Bob here at home. Today six years ago, I became a widow after 25 years of being married.  Bob had a good life and a good death at age 87. We had a rich partnership.  

Today I also want to speak about something we often avoid as a topic. Caregiving and caregivers. I have done caregiving before; it is how I met Bob. Being hired by a friend of mine to care for her husband Lloyd who happened to be Bob’s best friend, and who died 6 weeks later. Living with Bob, over the last years my caregiver role slowly increases, the last months are intense. I do all the physical caring chores myself, finding solutions how to avoid bedsores, how to bring comfort in impossible situations. For the last months, Araly, a professional caregiver – up to this day still my friend – comes once a week for 3 hours. It is not much. But she is the only one reflecting back to me the situation I am in. We laugh a lot; it relieves me hearing stories of worse scenarios at the places she has worked or is working now. Araly is impressed by my hands-on approach and creative solutions. I feel seen. This caregiving for Bob feels like my unavoidable fate and calling – as well as the ultimate expression of my love. All the while I am heartbroken, already grieving the impending huge loss. This labor of caring goes without any mention by most friends around me. 

 

And this is how it also plays out in wider society; hospice nurses won’t tell their friends what their real work is. This kind of work is normally “outsourced.” Not talked about, it becomes unseen. Our culture does not honor, or even notice, professional caregivers. Those who are performing this ultimate labor of love with all its nitty gritty – family, partners, or professionals – go unrecognized, are ignored. So, I will never forget when a friend from India asks to come over after Bob dies, he wants to thank me in person for performing this sacred task. In his country this is the custom, he says. 

 

Today six years ago, Bob dies 4:30 in the morning. The last months, last days of his life, of our life together, were and are sacred to me. The all-consuming intimacy is unspeakable, luminously beautiful, messy, otherworldly, and unforgettable ­– all at once. It is like we are in love all over again as in the beginning of our relationship. A sweetness fills the air. Without spelling it out, we are working together, this time not helping each other on a book or film project but on the preparation for transition. And then in the last 36 hours miraculously so much grace shows up. Friends, helpers, coincidences, all falls into place.  

 

Last breath is gone. The house is empty. Lying close to him, my hand on his heart, I feel it still fluttering once in a while, for a long time. Then I get up and ring my special brass tube gong in the living room and a seemingly never-ending haunting grieving song erupts from my chest, flooding through bones and throat, something I have never heard before. The melodious lament soars through the house out into the world and cosmos…  After washing and dressing his body with Araly, I transform his bed and the room into a shrine for friends and Bob’s daughter to come by for a last visit. 36 hours later, I finally call the cremation home. Right after they take the body away, I feel utterly bereft of everything. Bereft of being loved, of having Bob be my rock anchoring me. And bereft as well of being needed, helpful & useful. All is done…. 

 

Elation and closeness linger, immensity of light and beauty, waves of all-embracing-loving rock me. Appreciation for all things and relations, piercing insight about what it is all about. My heart ripped wide open for weeks. But… all is done. Only the owls keep me company, their hooting and silently whooshing about in the trees consoling me every night. They know. With devotion I organize, design and orchestrate the Memorial four weeks later. After that, speechless grief will take over. All is done… And from here it will be a long, long journey back to the realm of the living and to my own new existence and life, asking for willingness to be shattered and reborn over time... So, this year I am acutely aware that I am not the same person, much had to change and has changed. Having to find the courage to let die my old self and life, today this transformation feels like a strange luminous gift – my fate revealing itself as destiny. My ancestors behind me… 

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