Each time death visits me, it brings along a friend- grief.

 Death: the silent and peaceful twin of life and love

 

Each time death visits me, it brings along a friend- grief.

This pandemic has brought me closer to darkness- not in the traditional sense of how one would associate the ‘feelings, emotions and the actions’ connected with this word, but rather openly welcoming it into my life, acknowledging it and for the first time in years allowing it to stay and be at peace with it. Some of you may not be able to understand this or grasp how one can feel this- but maybe one day I truly hope you can feel what I feel and maybe when that happens, we can chat more about it. In the meantime, I will try and share how ‘grief’ and ‘death’ visited me.

The past year and this year have dished out a number of deaths our way- way too many I tell you! but that is the cycle of life, of reincarnation and death.

Last year, I lost a dear friend of mine, a dear soul that shared his magic with me, and I hope I shared some magic with him through the life and death of our friendship. Early on in our relationship/our life journey together, I felt he had made friends with death, grief, and darkness and entertained them often. I wish I had done the same, perhaps it could have made the process of ‘grief’ a lot easier. Maybe we could have talked about it and acknowledged death more openly? I used to be a believer of life and light, consuming darkness and death/grief, but never did I ever bring myself to challenge that. I knew no different. At that point in time, that was the only truth I knew.

I lost my twin soul 14 years ago and I have never made peace with it - I simply didn’t know how to. How does one make peace with the loss of a loved one? The thought of acknowledging death and grief was beyond me- impossible! It’s so much more difficult because as we age, our memories of our loved ones do not- it feels unfair. There is guilt.  Time doesn’t make things easier at all (not in my case), the hurt and loss remain, the pain is there- time only teaches you how to best adapt and grieve better. It just adds to your experience of grieving - so time doesn’t take away the loss and pain, it just gives you more pain and loss to focus on.

Loss. This year, I lost my dad, I lost a grandfather, a cousin sister, a cousin brother, and his dad (my uncle) within a span of few weeks. It’s a lot of deaths within a short time, and this is all being experienced in this current climate of ours (COVID/lockdown), balancing work, family, and personal responsibilities and roles. I used to think of death as being heartless, but I was wrong.     

         

Death has a heart. In the midst of trying to get on with life- I completely ignored what death was trying to tell me and teach me. On the eve of my birthday this year my dad collapsed- it will forever be etched in my memory and heart. I remember throwing my skype headphones down and ran to carry him/lift him up. I held him as my 5year old niece stood there completely scared and lost. Death whispered to me again. This time around, I decided to listen. God has always been very gracious with me and my family- we were on “borrowed time” to intentionally create happy memories with my dad.

It was when I was caring for my dad when I fully welcomed and acknowledge death and grief – as I squeezed myself in bed with dad, held my dad’s hand, and continued with my rambling- He just looked at me…he looked at me with love, longing for the past perhaps and peace, he also had this look… a mixture of sadness, love, a little bit of pride, thankfulness, and some pain.

Later, in the early hours of the morning, as I continued to hold dad’s hand fearful of not wanting him to feel alone, I felt a presence- it was a peaceful presence. This was a familiar presence, we knew each other- it has visited me on many occasions over the years times - it would come by and leave- almost reminding us that with the presence of life, we also have the presence of its twin- ‘death’.

I never acknowledged death and I hated the process of ‘grief’. But this time around, I was different- maybe experience, some sense of peace and contentment does that to people. I was at peace and my heart welcomed it- I acknowledged its presence. That night right into the early hours of the morning, as I held on to dad (occasionally bugging and irritating him), I sang and I prayed as he patiently and quietly listened, we both knew it was time. Not many people are as fortunate and blessed as I am- in the sense that you get to spend ‘borrowed time’ with a loved one to remind them again and again that they are so loved -that they are forgiven and to also seek forgiveness for our own shortfalls. God has always been loving towards me and my family- and this was yet another example of making beautiful memories with dad.

Unlike death and grief- there is some form of familiarity and exact recognition when it comes to the presence of love- with grief it's different. You don’t know when you are grieving, it’s usually in hindsight when you realise that that moment in time was grief.

One can tell when they are in love- I mean that’s when you say, “guys, I have fallen in love “or something along those lines- there is a ‘knowing’ when it comes to love- but with grief, it’s different. No matter how prepared you are, it hits you differently- it strips you of everything you have and know when it comes to loss, and if openly welcomed and acknowledged, it leaves you with peace and gratitude that can never be described or explained.

On the last night, dad and I sat for the longest time with death- I made tea and jumped into dad’s bed, it took me back to the many times I would do that when I was much younger- I was daddy’s girl- but as I sat there, I said hello to our guest, I spoke to death and in that moment in time felt like the right thing to do- I asked questions and said what I needed to-and for the first time ever in my life- I gave thanks to death and acknowledged death for it had played a critical part in my life. It’s sad, how we have come to view death as this scary and painful experience (in my case at least)- but if we really paid attention to the gift of peace that death brings, we then become more understanding of our own grief.

I used to be a strong believer of ‘life and light’ consuming ‘death’, 'darkness' and grief’, but now I see them as twin souls- they both bring life and peace – just a different kind- and a different kind of experience. When one of the two takes charge or is the lead, the other twin is fully present, holding us, holding our heart, and trying its best to make its presence known and for us to acknowledge it, to make peace with it and perhaps try and acknowledge it and have tea with them- side by side. There is nothing to fear. Before I said goodbye to my dad that morning, I said thank you to death and I held my dad and simply said, ‘I love you dad, I will see you soon’, because that’s how it should be. 

Life and death are twin souls, and they are always present- always around us, in our hearts, and in life. So it’s never goodbye, how can it ever be goodbye when we hold our own darkness alongside our light.