Monday, December 6, 2010

Death to RIP Messages.

     

    People fight to experience death. When someone passes away, all of a sudden, there are text messages, Facebook statuses, tweets, blogs, posts, tagged pictures and t-shirt emblazoned with dedicated RIPs. I mean, to each their own, but I'm just not with it. IT's like everyone just wants to know someone who died so they can pretend to have experienced loss: Trust me, you don't want to know what that feels like. You don't want to know what its like to have wished for nothing me than to die yourself. When you truly lose someone, you can feel that part of your heart wither away. You can feel it as it deteriorates and dies. That is loss. When people blame everything that's gone wrong with you on that one fateful day when you're entire world changed. It's not just the holidays that are different. Not just parties or birthdays. But every single day is different. Every single day I want to send my brother a text message. A "Yo," maybe. So that when he responds "Fuck you want" I can say, "Ya breath stinks. I can smell it in NY." Things along those lines.

      I attended my Aunt's wake yesterday. Wakes are the most bizarre happenings in the world. My favorite is the people who walk in with a smile on their face. Really? You're happy? Meanwhile, everyone exchanges stories about the last time they spoke to the departed. In real life, friends are hard to come by. But wakes are infested with best friends you never knew you had. There's so much "love". Now I didn't know 95% of the people at my Aunt's wake and to be honest, I barely knew my Aunt.  I'm not a fan of wakes. I mean no disrespect but I only felt so much. I saw her sporadically. Like I mentioned before; Holidays & Parties. She was also kind. Always smiling. She radiated love. I'd vouch there wasn't a teaspoon of contempt in her blood. So yes, I was sad to see her go. Because there will no longer be that  smile at family gatherings that I always looked forward to. But it won't change my every-single-day life. 

       I'm not interested in pity. Everyone is always sorry for someone's loss when that someone isn't really even sorry. Most of all, I felt for my Aunt's children. To lose a parent is something I fear. But I can't experience that through someone else. Not saying that I want to, but my time for that will come eventually. (Hopefully it won't be anytime in the next 50 years. ) I think people just like to cry. My mom's the worst of them all. She's a "hollering" crier. She wails. It's embarrassing. It was even embarrassing at my brother's funeral. But I think mother's are always dramatic. Sorry if this sounds wrong, I'm not saying their loss isn't great, I'm just saying that tears don't have noise. You can cry without wailing. It's possible. 

     I saw death once before I experienced it. My brother's best friend lost his brother a while back. The night of his bachelor party, actually. They lived 3 houses up the street from me and their house had this elevated porch. I remember we were driving down the street on one of the days of the wake. I looked up and saw my brother's friend on the porch. He was staring straight forward and from the car, I could see his bloodshot eyes. He was empty. His eyes said nothing. He didn't move. He had no expression. It was like he sitting there, dead. Not until I lost my brother did I understand what I saw: He was looking at everything and nothing. You're hyper-aware of everything that is going on but nothing matters. You have no life left in you. All you can do it breathe --even though you really don't even want to do that. You just want to lay in the casket and die, too.

      I didn't mean to disrespect my Aunt with my distance or lack of emotion at the wake... but I can't feel anything for anyone else anymore. The whole time, all I could think about was my loss. Everyone else in this world can die off one by one and I'll attend every wake. Every funeral. & for many I will even cry. When a friend passed from Diabetes, I surely cried for her... I sat in the park, on a swing & lit a Black(&Mild). It was all I could do to keep myself calm and not think about how I found out via an RIP AIM away message from a girl who was never a good friend to her in the first place. I was 8 hours away at school so I had to send my mom to attend in my place. Out of both respect & love...while she was there, I talked to her best friend, Candy, on the phone & that was my mom's purpose there (and the purpose of any wake actually). To express my condolences to the people who knew I meant it.  But I don't think I'll ever hurt like I did for Enver. When he passed, one of my cousins came up to me and asked "How does it feel? How does it feel to have your brother die?" The kid's always been a little off his rocker so I just looked at him. And he just looked at me, actually waiting for a response until my brother-in-law asked him to give me some space. 


       Because I did't want anyone's sorries. I didn't want their hugs or their condolences. I didn't want their help or their company. (just the truth) I wanted to die. I wanted to stop breathing. I didn't want to exist anymore. I wanted it to end. I just wanted the world to stop. I was tired of people crying and pretending and paying attention to me because I'm the sad little girl who just lost someone. Some people like that attention. I didn't. Especially because it was coming from the people who said the shirts my brother's best friend was selling were too expensive, even though he gave that money to my mom to help with the funeral costs. So I left. I went for a drive. Then a walk. Then I walked the dog.... I hate wakes. Matter fact when I die, I want it like this: If I should Die

       Thing is, I'm not the type to pretend either. My most favorite thing in the world is RIP Facebook groups. Everyone joins. Everyone wants a piece of the sadness. Everyone wants to post something about how they knew the person when in reality they never really gave a fuck and probably didn't even know them. Beyond that I love the people who think they knew the deceased --like girls who used to sleep with them. They're really the best grievers. They think they know everything. But they only know so much. I remember being at my brother's wake and seeing the girls file in. They might know things I don't, but they didn't know him. The things no one notices, the things only siblings know... like how he always use 3 ice cubes; no more-no less. But RIP messages and all that seem unnecessary and.... fake to me, to be honest. Because I sure as hell didn't want to talk about it when it happened. 

       I guess everyone experiences loss in a different way. Can't knock anyone... just speaking on my own behalf. It just seems people show the same amount of emotions for all loss when they've never really experience it. Like all the people who grieved for Michael Jackson's loss. I feel for his family, but Michael doesn't affect my every-single-day. And probably not yours either. (I don't know how I feel about Jay-Z just yet.) But my mother, my sister and I --and I'll even grant to his best friend (everyone knows who that is) --always have to make plans and realize that we can't call Enver. He can't come along. He can't be there. Like, how do I tell me kids about Uncle Enver? & before that... who's walking me down the aisle?  More so,  Jay just dropped Decoded and that would have been a great Christmas gift for my big brother. With an album. And maybe a fly blazer. Or a money clip... 

IDK... just my thoughts, man. Right or wrong. Just what I'm feeling at the time. 

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hello there! It's Lori; I always like stopping in to read your posts. You're a very talented writer; your words have a nice flow to them and you write from the heart.

I totally agree with you about wakes! I personally don't want to have one. It's a shame that people make an effort to show their respects when you're gone but don't do the same when your still here.

I can tell you many things about your brother. Even though our lives moved in two different directions as we got older, we still saw each other and occasionally we would have lunch together. Even if months had passed without seeing one another, when we did get together it was like I had just seen him yesterday.

I was in the car with you the day of the wake you're referring to. It was a huge wake with so many people attending that some roads were blocked off. When we were driving to the grave yard I can remember the line of cars was so long that people who were not in the funeral service were running out of patients and trying to 'break the line.' NOT ONE CAR WOULD LET THEM THROUGH! Your brother said to me, during that car ride, "This is how I want my funeral to be. Hundreds of people remembering me. I don't want to live long enough to be forgotten." Those where his exact words. It kind of helped me those first days when I was grieving for him.

When your brother passed I didn't attend visiting hours until the last day because I, like you, don't like them. I grieved in private and I still do. I know my loss can't compare with what you feel but I have to tell you that he was a HUGE part of my life back then and I still think of him often and always with a smile because that's how he would have wanted it.

God Bless!

Ella said...

Hey Lori,

I know you do. & I know Enver loved you because I did. Because you're a TRULY a good person. I know this because I remember how you used to help me write letters to him and my mom when I was little. I always appreciated it and I'll never for get it. You're the reason I can write as well as I do now. You taught me to read and write like an adult by the time I was 6. You know more than anyone that I've been writing for a long time :)

Yours was one of the faces I was glad to see at the wake. I know that you knew him because I know that you loved him as a PERSON & as a friend. As his little sister... I probably know more than I should have. And it was easy for me to see who cared for him. That's why the wake upset me like it did.

Enver & Nelson were stars. Now they're where stars rightfully belong :)

PS: Your kids are BEAUTIFUL!!!!!!!!