O Death, Won't You Spare Me Over For Another Year...
There's a certain irony here. Some folks on the Cult of the Dead thread seemed to be trying to imply that I (A) have no experience dealing with death & (B) have "issues" regarding death. Obviously, these are people who don't know me very well or have any idea of what my life's been like. Because the truth of the matter is, I saw more death by the time I hit legal drinking age than my Mom had seen by the time I turned legal drinking age. The number of my friends who died hit the double digits my sophomore year of college. Some were suicides, some were accidents, some were stupidity & a couple had major illnesses. My New Year's resolution that year was that none of my friends were allowed to die in the coming year. I think that's part of why The Morrigan claimed me-- Death is not a stranger to me. My cousin D once said that her holiday was Beltaine. Mine's Samhain- always has been. In fact, one of the things that drew me to ADF in the first place was the Ancestor veneration.
On top of the high mortality rate of my friends, I spent five years as a social worker working with senior citizens. They, too, have a high mortality rate-- although I did have a hard time with the couple that blew themselves up, but so did the rest of the center. I also wrote & lead the funeral rite that's in the current Liturgist's Yearbook. And I have a really wicked sense of gallows humor. Always have. I think it has something to do with reading Grimm's Fairy Tales as soon as I learned to read. :-)
But in the midst of all the hoopla, I have another funeral to go to this week. My good buddy bissonmomma's good friend H's husband died quite unexpectedly yesterday morning. They think it was probably a heart attack. He was 37-- a year older than me. Admittedly, he was very overweight and smoked constantly but it's still kinda freaky. People my age are not supposed to die from heart attacks. They just aren't. I can't really say that I knew him well or was overly fond of him but I know Jen & her hubby & H feel his loss terribly. My grief is really for their pain & I wish he was alive for their sakes.
Yeah, I don't know anything about dealing with death.
On top of the high mortality rate of my friends, I spent five years as a social worker working with senior citizens. They, too, have a high mortality rate-- although I did have a hard time with the couple that blew themselves up, but so did the rest of the center. I also wrote & lead the funeral rite that's in the current Liturgist's Yearbook. And I have a really wicked sense of gallows humor. Always have. I think it has something to do with reading Grimm's Fairy Tales as soon as I learned to read. :-)
But in the midst of all the hoopla, I have another funeral to go to this week. My good buddy bissonmomma's good friend H's husband died quite unexpectedly yesterday morning. They think it was probably a heart attack. He was 37-- a year older than me. Admittedly, he was very overweight and smoked constantly but it's still kinda freaky. People my age are not supposed to die from heart attacks. They just aren't. I can't really say that I knew him well or was overly fond of him but I know Jen & her hubby & H feel his loss terribly. My grief is really for their pain & I wish he was alive for their sakes.
Yeah, I don't know anything about dealing with death.