death

I.C.E.


I am big on being prepared. Even if the preparation consists of nothing more than periodic dress rehearsals in my daydreams.

It’s weird to daydream about disaster and tragedy, but I was the little girl whose Barbies’ were all widowed women. And I was the teen who stared out the window of Sister Jean Freund’s South American history class and fantasized Red Dawn scenario’s. The readiness is all, as Hamlet would say once he quit whining.

During last summer’s mini-health alert, Rob put a file together for me containing all the “just in case” information. It was overkill. But it helped knowing that neither of us would be forced to wade through boxes in search of policy numbers and phone contacts. Sometimes having the details worked through in advance makes it easier to face the unthinkable.

But when he had his heart-attack, I realized that I had no idea where the file had gotten to. In our perpetual state of renovation, the minutia of life shifts from room to room, depending on where the hot reno action is taking place.

Rob took the office apart right after Christmas and the contents of the room were scattered in totes, boxes and file cabinets between the living and dining rooms. The file vanished into the triangle.

We’ve been putting the office back together these last few days, and Rob decided we needed an I.C.E. binder.

In case of emergency – crack open.

There are two of them and they have a prominent place in the organizing cabinet. Everything pertinent to life after one of our death’s is there.

“You’ll need it, ” he said, “as it’s clear now that you will outlive me.”

I scoffed and reminded him that I could be wiped out in an instant on the road from town or at the intersection. And for all we actually know, my heart could be riddled with disease just waiting to surprise us.

But I am always cognizant of the promise I made before we married, that I would let him go first. Even though it’s not my call, I did offer and the universe has a way of taking one at one’s word in these matters.

At any rate, Rob was quite sober yesterday as we discussed the I.C.E. book. He’s chafed a bit this last week. He is still on driving restriction, forbidden to engage in work even via email and bored out of his mind.

He doesn’t look sick at all. I had another husband who didn’t look sick to the naked  eye either once.

On his walk yesterday though, he overdid it. Went too far and then had to get himself back because he forgot to take his cell phone.

Six miles.

At about an hour and a half, I began to toy with the idea of hopping in the truck to go look for him. He was surprised to see I hadn’t when he finally got home – which is telling.

“I thought about Shelley, ” he said. “She used to walk that same loop with edema and a compression bandage on her leg and cancer spreading everywhere. If she could finish it, so could I.”

He is stubborn like that, but this morning he is still in bed at 10 AM.

In case of emergency, you break glass or open a binder. I am not there and I may never be. But I could be. So we organize, just in case.

Unavoidable


So I dipped a toe into the topic of the avoidable, but didn’t delve into the flip-side, did I?

The young woman isn’t identified in the photo credits. Perhaps the photographer, Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images didn’t ask. It would take a ballsy person to stroll up to such a scene and play 20 questions though I imagine he’d have gotten chapter verse and the annotated notes if he had.The grave belongs to U.S. Marine Corps Lance Corporal Noah Pier. He was killed February 12, 2010 in Marja, Afghanistan and is resting at Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia, which is just outside the capital.

I’ve been there. It’s beautiful, belies its purpose and history. Arlington was the plantation home of Robert E. Lee’s wife. They abandoned it when he turned down Lincoln’s offer to head the Union Army, resigned his commission and went to serve the Confederacy. The mansion was built by George Washington’s grandson and the father of Lee’s wife, Anna.

The house was commandeered and used as a garrison and it was Union General Mieg’s idea to start burying dead soldiers there, partly as a rebuke to Lee. Mieg’s own son was among the first war dead interred there.

I wonder. Did he sleep on the left side of their bed? Is this the first restful nap she’s had in months? Were they married? Engaged?

Not that any of that matters but I bet she’d have told Chip if he asked.

I found the picture in my blog reader and then just after I found a post about John Cazale, the actor. You’d know him if you saw him. He only made five movies before he died of bone cancer in 1978, but all five were nominated for best picture at the Academy Awards, and he is cited by folks like Pacino, De Niro and Streep as being one of their great influences.

But that’s not why I found him interesting or mention him now.

Meryl Streep and John Cazale were engaged to be married when he died. She nursed him throughout his illness. She even took a minor part in The Deer Hunter, just to be with him and take care of him as he went about making his last movie.

She was with him when he died.

And then six months later, she was married.

Some people would find that shocking. Judge her even.

Yet, she’s been married for 31 years and has four children and by all accounts is very content, happy even.

She helped put together a documentary about Cazale and agreed to be interviewed. She is puffy-eyed and tearful at turns on the screen as she talks about him.

And yet …

I wonder about Noah Pier and this girl. On this most recent Memorial Day she is napping on his still fairly fresh grave, but where will she be mid-summer? Or fall? Or next year?

Losing people we love isn’t anymore avoidable than someday being “lost” ourselves. But it isn’t the end … of anything really.

For a Reason


Gravestones, Koyoto, Japan

Image via Wikipedia

Everything happens for a reason.

 

Without a doubt that is one of the more irritating platitudes you will hear during the first year or so of widowhood. Because even if it is true, it’s the last thing you want to try and force your shattered heart to accept. That the love you had, the life you lived, was in some ways never meant to be. At least not in the Hallmark card version of marriage most of us view as the rule rather than the exception. Two white-haired octogenarians sitting on a porch in the twilight, holding hands and rocking slowly in a swing.

 

My husband got sick just about five years ago when I was pregnant with our only child. He died a long slow degrading death. It was a genetic disease, and he passed the marker for it along to our daughter who will someday run the risk of passing it on to a son, who will die the same way his grandfather did. Meant to be?

 

We live in a cause/effect world, so yes, probably there is a reason for everything that happens. That doesn’t mean that the reason was something profound or wonderful or even good for all parties involved. And it doesn’t have anything to do with people being good or bad. People will come into and exit our lives for our whole life. That is just the way life is. Does knowing this make it easier to accept? Hurt less?

 

Was I meant to be a widow? Raise a child on my own? Maybe. For a short time this has been my destiny. Even if there is a “plan” mapped out for us all, what difference does that make? Would knowing make Will’s death, the way he died even, hurt less? Make being a widowed mother easier? Meeting Rob the way I did and coming to love and trust and depend on him as I do. Destiny? Sometimes there are no answers. We just do the best we can. Get up every day and put one foot in front of the other. Be grateful for the wonderful things that once were and in awe of that which is.

 

A family came through the house last evening with yet another realtor. Very nice. Very polite. The husband was more interested than the wife which makes me think they will not be the eventual buyers. When it comes to buying a home, it is usually about what mom wants. Three very well-behaved children. I want the house to go to a family. It would make me feel better to know that someone will live out those dreams here that Will and I were never meant to.