New Year's Day: When Someone Dies The Mundane May be Your Greatest Gift

New Year's Day in year's past has been a day filled with pithy resolutions that are broken in less than two or three weeks, hang overs from over indulgence during my younger years, watching football and long leisurely brunches. This year started differently in many ways - today I realized that when someone dies the mundane may be the greatest gift.

Before receiving "the call," 2006 started with waking up early and taking time for centering prayer.  It was one of the first New Year's Days that there were no true morning plans since the host of our annual neighborhood brunch was ill.  Tim and I took turns going out for a walk and run.  The morning then turned into a family morning sharing homemade blueberry waffles and bacon with Grandma, football and watching Eli's new Thomas video for at least the 23rd time in less than a week. 

I was doing the mundane of washing the morning dishes and thinking about what else I wanted to do as Eli and Tim took a late afternoon nap.  I thought....good an hour of quiet time....then the phone rang which changed the course of my day.

There's a group of girlfriends that have been meeting up for meals, good conversation and to share various special occasions pretty much since I moved to Seattle close to ten years ago. It's an interesting group who probably has a good 17 year span between ages, yet always seeks and finds the parts of our lives that cross and intertwine.  It's the first group of girlfriends I met after moving here from the east coast and the same group that hosted my party when I received my master's degree, hosted my engagement party and celebrated both my wedding and the birth of Eli.

At this moment I sit in sadness and grief.  How could it be that Anne, who's really an angel in earthly form, son is dead and he's not even 21?  He's had brain cancer for quite some time and has had many ups and downs over the past year.  Anne diligently sent out a weekly email keeping a group of 50+ people up to date on him and her life.  It has been an amazing journey and life to both read about and personally know.

He was very special and wanted to be a minister and spent his time giving back to community and specifically homeless adults and teens even when he was ill.  It filled him and motivated him.  He has touched a lot of lives for the better.

After hanging up the phone I called a couple of the girlfriends to pass the news and I cried for Anne and her family and I cried for myself.  Each time I have confronted death since my father's passing two years ago I cry new tears as I think about what I miss most which is the ability to have a conversation where I can hear his voice. 

I kept doing the dishes and thinking, how mundane.  Look how methodically I am rinsing each dish and stacking it in the dishwasher.  There is no meaning to these actions. 

I look up and notice that Tim has left the football game on, although the TV is on mute, and I see a player on his knees banging the football with both hands on the ground...I imagine his elation and the roaring crowds reaction and the paradox of standing in my kitchen in silence and sadness.

I think about Eli dancing in the kitchen snacking on a left over blueberry waffle and dancing in circles perhaps 10 minutes earlier and the feeling a happiness that filled my body. 

I cry as I think about Anne at home comforting her other son and daughter and knowing she will never again see her eldest son and they will never see their brother. There is a deep sadness in the finality of knowing he will never come home from college for the weekend and play with his new puppy.  They will never again hear his voice when was healthy and your average hungry teen that would head straight for the kitchen and eat leftovers from the previous night's meal and tell his mom how happy he is to be home and eat some real food.

I think about how mundane actions like that may have seemed all the previous weekends until she thinks about the last time it happened and is filled both with joy and sadness.

I think of the gift I have just received in this death...the gift to be conscious and to be present to the mundane nuances of every day life that is the foundation of the life we create.  And I think, no resolutions this year...I am grateful to be alive and aware.

 

Regards, Michele Corey, Advanced Approach, Knee Deep:  A dose of insight from your not so average entrepreneur

Comments

[Tricia]

Hi Michele,
Your article caught my eye because our holidays were different this year due to a death. Only we don't have all the memories you have. Jackson was 3 weeks old when he died, and I'm his great Grandma. For his parents (first child) and his grandma (first grandchild) it has been especially hard.
What is saving me is my belief that we choose our parents and they us, we come in on our schedule, and we leave on our schedule. Why only 3 weeks? I haven't yet been given the answer to that, although I have some ideas. I do know the knowingness will come eventually. I've lost two husbands, my parents, and my oldest son. And I now have the reasons for all of them leaving when they did.

And I agree with you; the mundane helps - for many reasons. Not the least is to keep our sometimes too fertile minds busy from thoughts which don't help and will get us nowhere.

Thank you for sharing.