Dying/broken/forgiven.... now I begin

Born: 17-06-56....gemini.... monkey
re-born: 3-09-80
born again\found: 14-04-08
other notable dates: 10-03-68; 03-09-87; 23-03-96;
1-05-98; 31-01-02; 5-04-04

Interests: movement, stressed/transgressive embodiment, lived experience (body\space\time\relation)
expression ( word, dance, text, image, story, music, poetics)
learning, yielding......

Hopes for the blog:
offer up the wild intersectedness of lived experience and engage others in creative, expressive, perhaps irreverant, hopefully playful, and respectful encounters....
enact kindness
create moments of pause for disclosure, discovery, stillness

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

words that need to be said

During these past months and weeks leading up to my father's death, my mom and my brother and my brother -in -law have been doing the bulk of the at home care-giving.  The rest of us siblings and other family members have been doing what we can given the contingencies of  distance and job contexts. It was loving and intense work and it  took  its toll, both physical and emotional. I said in an earlier post that I expected to learn, and that there was much to learn when a family goes through the catastrophic health decline and death of a loved one.
What is most present for me now, as  insight, these days immediately following the funeral and the ongoing and amazingly tender interactions  with my mom, and my sister and my son, and also with my brothers and my brother in law ( who is a brother in every sense of the word!) is the need to say the words that often get forgotten or dismissed as unimportant in the larger swirl of more intensely felt emotions, like love and fear and confusion and despair, and the more intensely felt physical states, like exhaustion and pain... the words that those giving and receiving care need to say and hear, the words that enact love with humility and grace.
Here they are: I'm sorry. I was wrong. I need help. I don't know.
I had expected to learn. I am learning. There is much to learn.

7 comments:

  1. Thank you.

    After having been through this many times I think maybe those two words could be squeezed in as well. Yes every passing is a lesson to the living. It's what makes the imminent event a personal experience. May you grieve well and come to your own peace H.

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  2. I'm sorry to hear about the loss of your father.

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  3. wm-- amen to the thank you. i feel like i am grieving well. writing certainly helps. thanks for the kind words.
    pisces- thanks for being so kind and thoughtful.

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  4. Powerful sentiments. I will tell you that even now, eight years after my father passed, I am surprised to find that I am still learning.

    Peace to you and yours.

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  5. intelliwench--thanks for this thoughtful comment; i imagine my journey will likely be similar to yours.

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  6. Me-- thanks for the visit and the sentiment.

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