Reading Orchid's journal

On mourning

Last week my dear grandmother is gone flying with the angels. After my grandfathers death several years ago when I was a child she was one of the closest people around me who passed away. This leads me to a many thoughts which I’d like to share or at least I’m in need to write down somehow.
First of all I’d like to start at that very day. She was 87 (I didn’t know she was that old already), still lived in her own flat and was pretty laborious even at that age. Entering a nursing home has been a scene of horror for her. Anyway, she wasn’t sick or something but didn’t feel well that day. A doctor couldn’t help really. But in the night she felt worse and called her son who saw no alternative to drive her to the hospital. The evening after that, she went to sleep forever. It turned out that she has suffered a heart attack which the doctor hasn’t remarked – and – as a result also caught a pneumonia. When me and my husband null came to see her in the afternoon in the hospital she was no longer addressable because the meds have given her something to sleep. Seeing all of the family members there and her lying there so helpless I broke into tears immediately and embraced my mother for who it must be really really bad. I sat down and numerous thoughts and images came to my mind. Mostly nice memories and situations we were in and a whole lot feelings of guilt. She has never been my favourite grandmother because she was quite difficult to handle. She was old-school and quite critical which, for me, wasn’t really nice because as a child I didn’t want to be forced to say thank you all the time. Or: Not by her. I don’t want to say I was a brat and difficult to raise but, well I think compared to the other grandmother I just preferred the one who was always nice and gave me things to eat.
This doesn’t mean I hate her, no never, I just felt being around her was too complicate so I evaded her until the last few months.
In the last few months my mind slowly changed. I began to think of her more often and whenever I drove around the town (we live in the same) I tinkered with the idea to visit her but regrettably I left it at that. I didn’t proceed any further yet but delivered greetings for her and asked my mother how she was and if there’s anything new from granny.
Today I am more than ashamed of my bad behaviour and regret every single time I thought “There’s no time to see her today. Maybe next time”. But there is no next time and I’ve been so naïve to think she’ll live on and on and there’s plenty time to see her. Hearing her curriculum vitae at the obsequies in the church I thought: “I can’t believe it but I didn’t know her at all!” Hearing the farewell letters of my cousins I thought: “Why didn’t she tell this to me and why didn’t she do these things with me?” The relationships between them and her and between me and her must have been sooo different. Suddenly I felt I’ve got no right to cry because I didn’t love and know her like that. But it makes me sad nevertheless. The missed moments, the missed talks, that she had to go, that my mother and my brother lose her… I am afraid it’s more self-pity than real love that makes me cry and I feel even worse. I have been a terrible grandchild, I know. But instead of hating or ignoring me she never stopped being a careful granny. I am a monster. And she didn’t deserve to be carried away. And had I known before I… The last time I saw her it was shortly over lunch-time and we didn’t talk a lot. I wished I could’ve had the time to talk to her in peace before all that. (BTW that was not an easy thing to do because she didn’t hear well and you had to say things five times or very loud, which she didn’t appreciate). That is really something that burdens me.

On obsequies

Is there anybody out there who likes obsequies? I can’t imagine. I see there’s a reason for them because people want to say good bye when somebody dies and we’re a gregarious creature so that it feels normal to gather when somebody passes away. But I felt it was the worst thing to do. There were so many people and everyone of them shook hands with my mother and tried to comfort her. But I think this makes it even worse. So why hold up this gauntlet? Wouldn’t it be better if people could mourn in private? I don’t want to carry out this thought because it’s a tradition and I think it’s unfair to the ones who die and the ones who mourn and want it that way. It’s just a thought because I felt quite exposed yesterday at the obsequies. And I wasn’t the central point at all. I just think at obsequies your forced to cry. And what concerns me, I am a repressive mourner which means that I repress negative thoughts as long as I can. I even think: forever.

On loss

An example is my beloved dog who passed away when I was 17 or 18. It was like hell for me. I repressed the last picture and I still don’t want under all circumstances retrieve it. The pain would be too big. It’s even difficult to write about my dog today or think of him because then it’s possible that the picture comes back. I will close my eyes about it forever. And this is just the beginning. I can say to myself: Well, the people who leave us will have a cozy nest in heaven and look down from their cloud to us but it doesn’t change the fact that they’re no longer with us. It’s the hardest thing. I don’t want to think about losing more of my beloved ones. That would be extreme. I don’t know how to survive something like that. I just beg it won’t come in a long, long, very long time.

"Sie wollen nichts anderes. Sie wollen kämpfen! Sie sind Soldaten! Fucking Wahnsinnige!" - Noel G.