Is it grief, or something more positive?

Grief is forever. We have already established this, so pardon the repetition. It is just a broken record at the moment. Today, one of grief’s little tricks jumped all over me, so I have to hash it out.

It’s a bit like a “back burner” deal. At times, grief does a low boil or barely even simmers. Other times, it gives off a little steam or boils over violently. Regardless, it is always on that back burner, ever present, offering the potential to spill over and make a mess of things as if in defiance of being ignored.

I will get back to my dissertation torment eventually, but for the moment I need to spill my guts on the tugs of grief that keep reminding me where the research for me truly began. Besides, as I’ve said before, “It’s all connected.” This hashing it out is part of the process.

Case in point: I had a flashback to my brother John today. These are usually random images that come to mind, completely unsolicited, but occasionally, like today, they throw me for a loop. Maybe it was a little nudge from little brother to remind me that I hadn’t reminisced about him lately.

I like to think the out-of-the-blue memory flashes are messages from Heaven from him or my sister, kindof like one of the only ways they can “keep in touch.” There’s no Facebook to Heaven, so I have to use my imagination, as we all do, when we want to communicate with someone who is not “here.”

Today my mind jumped back to the day John died and my frantic drive up Route 8 to Griffin Hospital after getting the call from my mother that he had taken a turn for the worse. It is an unpleasant memory and still very vivid for me. It isn’t a memory I intentionally return to when I am thinking about my life before January 8, 2002. I have no idea where it came from or why.

That is all the flashing back that took place today. Just that instant downer that started to take me further into the memory of that day before I instinctively shut it down. Clicked the “off button” and sent it packing.

But not really. And that is my point. There is no “off button” with grief.

There is nothing new in my observation here, though for some people who have not experienced it yet, it may seem exaggerated or melodramatic. It isn’t. It’s just fact.

But the thing that I am connecting to, relating to, trying to get to, is the way other people’s grief touches ours. I’m not sure yet, but I may be saying that the grief of others somehow helps our own to heal. So now, finally, I am getting to the subject I have been meaning to speak to for a couple of weeks but perhaps subconsciously have been avoiding. I need to open a discussion about the tragic Petit case.

I say “open a discussion” because it has taken me so long to get to the topic, I will never be able to say all that is on my mind and in my heart here if I stick to my usual roughly-1,000 word limit per post. So expect that I will have more to say on the Petit case in the coming weeks. Right now, I need to share a small piece of it because it is so very important, and yes, it is an emerging theme in my dissertation journey.

You would have to be living on the Planet Jupiter to not know about the horrendous murders of Jennifer Hawke-Petit and her two beautiful daughters, Hayley and Michaela, in their family home in Cheshire, Connecticut in 2007. Dr. William A. Petit survived the nightmare of their slayings and now is bearing up to survive the court trials of the men accused -- one of whom recently was swiftly convicted by a jury and is awaiting a decision in the penalty phase of his trial; the second of whom is expected to stand trial next year.

Notice I do not mention their names. It’s my own recoiling the precludes me from assigning a human element to the beings that treated a family so inhumanly. The grief of Dr. Petit cannot be described in careful words because it is something that one can only feel, and feel to the depths of one’s very essence.

Dr. Petit was quoted in a local paper several weeks ago when the trial of the first man accused was about to begin, and media coverage again was making Dr. Petit’s private pain a public experience. A collective grief experience, at least in one sense.

His words jumped off the page and seared into my psyche because they expressed my own feelings so well. The paper recounted how, during a pretrial hearing for suspect (now convicted killer) #1, the names of Petit’s wife and daughters were read out loud in the courtroom.

Petit must have told a reporter afterward that it made him happy to hear their names. Given the circumstances, the setting, and the situation, this reaction might be hard to understand. But the partial quote in the paper spoke volumes about this man’s grief. When you add his quoted words to the context, it takes on a deeper meaning. He said it made him happy to hear their names “to show that they were people.”

To show that they were people.

To remind everyone that Jennifer, Hayley, and Michaela were here once. They were living, loving, caring human beings; a wife and daughters; someone’s friends; someone’s relatives; the source of someone’s pick-me-up moment, from a smile each of them offered just because. Jennifer, Hayley, and Michaela were all of these things and more, and Petit’s verbal reminder was moving as much as it was perfect to describe why grief never leaves us.

To show that they were people. Technically, is this grief? Or is it love seeping through a memory?

Just push ‘play'

My “grief” button is apparently stuck in the “on” position.

Another family funeral this week. Dear Uncle Joe. My cousins mourning the loss of their father, and another ritual of family, tears, ceremony, and remembering.

Grief, please, give me a break. Isn’t it enough that I am drowning in the literature of death, sorting through philosophies about how human beings deal with this part of life? My intentional study of this topic is being supplemented by the real life experience of it -- and it feels like every time I turn around, someone else is enduring a loss and I am the filter through which it runs.

We are all “filters” in this sense. The grief of others touches us and we are transformed, even if it is in the tiniest way.

But this time I am having a selfish grief experience. Or maybe internalizing it in a way that is bringing up “old stuff.” Whatever it is, it is familiar to me. As I think about my cousins losing their father at the robust age of 90, I am instantly compelled to thoughts of my own father’s mortality.

This is not a new one for me, folks. I have always dreaded the death of my parents, knowing that it would happen one day and knowing that I am never going to be ready for it.

For the record, neither of my parents is going anywhere anytime soon. I am thinking about this because I am empathising with my cousins in their sadness, and relating to their experience because I know it will one day be my own.

There is a term for this, though it escapes me now. I think it is called “anticipatory grief.” For people who have experienced the loss of someone very dear and close to them, this syndrome is the dread that you carry knowing that this life is fragile and temporary.

It means that somone you love will one day not be there when you stop by for a visit, or won’t be on the other end of the phone when it rings. The laughs, the struggles, the comforting hugs, or the playful teasing will only remain in your memory, which is where you will return to frequently to soothe the pain of separation. It will require a tremendous adjustment in your mindset to move from the opportunity for direct contact and human exchange to a strictly spiritual connection.

The feeling that you live with when you begin to slip into this anticipatory grief can be painful all by itself, even though it is self-inflicted and largely within your control to dismiss.

The feeling is fear.

For me, it can reach not-quite panic proportions and I think it explains a lot about my personality and the way that I need to document every event and important person in my life. Photographs, video, jotting things down -- these are the things I resort to, no, the things that I run to, so that I can capture the tidbits of my loved ones before they disappear. I need to collect all that I can, so that I can wrap myself in those tangibles and memories when they are all that I have left.

Now before you dig out your contact list to recommend a good psychiatrist, let me just say that I am not dwelling on that which I have no control over. I simply have a keen awareness of the “life is short” concept, and have a distinct philosophy that compels me to keep my life in the “Play” position, instead of putting things on hold for a more convenient time.

Author C.S. Lewis wrote An Observed Loss about the death of his wife, and in sorting through his grief, suggested that the experience of grief is forever. Not what I want to hear at the moment, but it may be why I am feeling “stuck” in the grief mud. Lewis said, “In grief, nothing ‘stays put.’ One keeps on emerging from a phase, but it always recurs. Round and round. Everything repeats. Am I going in circles, or dare I hope I am on a spiral?’ (Lewis, 1961: 46)

Not a happy thought, but evidence that to grieve means to hurt in our experience of love. That really is not a bad thing. If you really think about it, it is a wonderful outward expression of a deep sentiment that means we have shared life with someone, we have melded spirits with them in some way, and we have been blessed with the precious gift of love.

The fear that anticipatory grief renders is manageable. Fear suggests the absence of faith, and if I step back from the anxiety, I know that the meaningful relationships in my life will last forever. They will just move from one realm to another. Faith has shown me that.

I believe that the only way to overcome fear is to face it squarely. So the thought for today is this: In the song of life, just push play. Then dance your way through it fearlessly.

Memories are the comfort

Today my family said goodbye to Auntie Effie. On a day that, on its surface, should provoke sadness, I am feeling buoyant after the services this morning that brought together a gathering of perhaps a hundred or so, give or take.

Auntie Effie would have been 100 years old on October 18, just a week from today, and that itself is a remarkable feat that most of us can only wonder at. She was born Stephanie Stochmal, but came to be called “Effie” in the family by her 16 brothers and sisters and all the nieces and nephews eminating from that amazingly large brood. She later became Mrs. John Pczonka, but always, to most, she was "Effie."

I asked my father where “Effie” came from, trying to get the goods on the back story that may be there. My husband had suggested that perhaps one of the younger siblings had trouble pronouncing her given name and could only manage the “EFFIE” part, so it stuck.

My Dad, who is 20 years younger than Auntie Effie, didn’t know. He remembers his parents called her Stefania, the Polish version of her beautiful name. Neither of my grandparents spoke English, having come to America in the early 1900s from Tarnow and Kolbuszowa, Poland, so Polish is what was spoken at home -- even down to the names of the children.

Cousin Kenny -- the oldest of Auntie’s three grandchildren -- spoke genuinely about the woman that his brothers and their children came to call “Babi” (pronounced Bobby -- I really don’t know how they spell it, but since it is the mispronunciation of the Polish word for grandmother -- Babci -- I am spelling it with the “c” missing, hoping it will suffice to make this point.)

Auntie Effie was born in Poland in 1910, apparently the only one of the 17 children to have that distinction. It just happened that my grandmother -- a teenage bride living in America with her husband and two small children -- was visiting her own mother in Poland when Stephanie was born. It was just one of the ways that Destiny said Effie was meant to stand out.

In most other ways, Auntie Effie seemed to be much like her siblings -- tough, “old school,” but practical and creative in assessing most situations. Kenny highlighted the three lessons handed down to him by his beloved “Babi,” and they were on-the-money accurate in reminding us of Auntie’s essence.

Be strong.

Be independent.

Be kind.

What great advice to pass along, and now they will be a mantra connecting me to her. I don’t remember much about Auntie Effie, but I do know that my experience of her throughout my life was consistent with those attributes. She was one tough lady, capable and strong, but sweet and caring at the same time. I bet she was a wonderful grandmother, because I could see it reflected in the way her daughter, son-in-law, grandchildren, and great grandchildren presented the united picture of respect and love for her today and always.

It is comforting to have rituals for saying goodbye to our loved ones. In my family, it is the Adzima Funeral Home that has handled arrangements for most of the family funerals. It was no different for Auntie Effie. Adzima’s and St. Michael’s Church -- which my grandparents helped to establish -- were the familiar combo. This is where our ritual had to be.

Following the funeral mass, I drove with my parents to the cemetery service, and kept quiet to allow the opportunity for my father to express whatever he may have on his mind as we left the graveside of one of the sisters who had undoubtedly been like another mother to him as a child growing up in such a full household.

It took about five seconds. My father mentioned how he had looked at Auntie Effie the night before at the wake, as he and my mother approached the casket to say a prayer at her side. Auntie looked perfect, right down to her manicured fingernails.

“I was looking at her hands,” my father said. Funny how we both had noticed something about her hands, folded with a delicate rosary wrapped loosely within them. I had noticed the light pink polish, but Dad had connected much more deeply.

“I was thinking, ‘I wonder how many times she smacked me on the rear end when I was a kid.’” Then, without missing a beat, he said, “But I wonder how many hugs she gave me too.”

Loving hands. Strong hands. Hands that carried and held and supported. A fuzzy memory, rooted in reality, tied to a bond that only siblings know. Wrapped in the bow of family love.

I was blessed throughout the morning to hear the anecdotes of other relatives, all of which reminded me of the aunt whom I mostly recall walking Derby Avenue back and forth from her home on Mount Pleasant Street. She walked with a stateliness, strong in her step, and firm, like the very task of walking carried an importance that required her diligent attention.

One of my younger cousins noticed a bottle of wine on the table at the repast, and commented on it because it reminded her of her own connection to Auntie Effie. Auntie liked a glass of wine now and then, and had saved an empty Chianti bottle that she and her husband had shared. The bottle was transformed into art work -- I don’t know by whom. It was colorfully decorated with the multicolored drippings of candles. I’m not sure if I am remembering the details correctly, but they aren’t the point of this.

This is the point: When this cousin expressed a genuine appreciation of the memento, Auntie’s reaction was one that might be described as typical of her. "T," upon seeing the bottle one day, exclaimed, “I love this!” To which Auntie Effie replied, “Take it.”

I wish I had thought to ask "T" where she keeps that special memento, but it doesn’t matter. It is a lovely sign of a life that was here and now lives on in another dimension in time. Just as our memories of Auntie Effie do.

There is comfort in the knowing.

Why is this so hard?

I’m late with this blog posting but I won’t make excuses. My goal of posting new insights each week still remains, but sometimes the “process” hits a bump in the road. For sure, the journey to dissertation is doing a little four-wheeling at the moment.

After my last blog post -- Getting comfortable with death -- I received some great insights from readers that surprised me and boosted my confidence that I am on to something here. One reader who cares for hospice patients spoke of the amazing fearlessness of death -- the acceptance that many of them ultimately achieve. She sees a change in the way society has made it OK to grieve.

Another reader shared an example of how the social network sharing of grief introduced her to a young man she never met in life. Through the grief and sharing of that lost life, she now knows him. This is a clear point that runs through my research. The sharing, the memorializing, is the way we keep them with us. So I was nodding as I read that comment as well.

Still another reader hit on a key aspect in my exploration: the privacy element. It’s not just grief that we are sharing publicly; it’s all sorts of things. We know that we can share it, in this public way, and that seems to open the flood gates, so to speak.

What is at work here?

Yet another reader offered a perspective that needed to be noticed: this public sharing through electronic messages -- whether it’s Facebook, email, or some other internet-based communication -- happens with, through, and in, a buffer of technology. If we’re so comfortable talking about death, why do we not make the extra effort to ‘be comfortable’ in person? Isn’t a kind word at a time of grief even more welcome when it is accompanied by a sincere look of compassion, concern, or better yet, a hug?

All good points and all part of my search. Still, I am not speeding forward. Still, I feel like I am in first gear, like my old Wrangler Sahara digging to find its footing in the mud and spinning those larger-than-standard-sized tires until the rocks and sludge are flying.

I noticed tonight that some of my colleagues who are in the PhD program with me are scheduled to present on their topics or, worse, are defending their dissertations in the coming weeks. Meanwhile, I am drowning in death lit.

What have I done? Worse, what am I doing?

The pressure of finishing school is definitely clobbering me about the head. I have other writing to do in my life -- memoir writing, in particular, I think, will be my most frequent style, as I am fascinated by the stories of people’s lives. But I must keep them simmering while I am slugging away at this research, and it really bugs me to have to do so. I promise I will continue this research thread once I have the degree; can’t I just get it over with, so that I can mix it up a little in my writing life?

I suppose I just have to realize that the pull of other creative writing projects will never subside, and I must stick to the task at hand -- REALLY STICK TO IT -- if I am going to finish in a realistic timeframe and not get left behind by every classmate with whom I endured the PhD coursework.

As I started to explain at the start of this post, I hit a bump in the road this week and have made little progress on my research writing. I was beginning to think my Mentor, Professor One, is playing a little game with me: he gives me comments on my proposal that set me back several paces, and tells me that I am “close,” so keep persevering. I just know he is laughing his butt off any time I leave his office after one of these meetings. He’s got me pegged for graduation in 2015, I bet.

I’m not having it. I need to clear the decks. Get really serious. Yes, that is what I must do. Which means I may have to go into hibernation -- avoid all family and friend functions, no football games, no outdoor activities, no crappy television watching. I really have been slacking in that sense -- letting “life” in. Oh, I haven’t been neglecting my research, not at all. I’ve just been allowing myself to do other things to keep a healthy balance. The problem is, I took on a few “extra” things this fall that I probably should have kept on the back burner unti I am finished with this project. So my balancing act is way overloaded.

Hindsight, of course, is the great teacher, and I know what I have to do. The gloves are off. I am not going to be left behind, eating the dust of my PhD colleagues as they prepare to be fitted for their caps and gowns. The competitive gene that runs in my family runs deep. I want it too, so I need to just jump in it.

And I will. Right after I take the dog to the vet, get the oil changed, and vacuum my living room.

Later this week: Parallel grief. I need to blog about the Petit case.