A quick word about death

I just spent the last week with the family, dealing with the aftermath of the accident that took my beloved cousin away from us all. Obviously, I didn’t get a scrap of writing done except for the eulogy, and even then it had to be compiled within an hour because all of us were just running ragged, between the paperwork and visits to the hospital to visit my ailing aunt and younger cousin.

Literature in a hurry. I don’t think I’d ever be a great poet. Trying to condense the worth and wonder of a person’s life – even if cut short – was one of the hardest pieces of works I ever had to commit to. Writing it was easy; releasing it as the final edition “for publication”, so to speak, was rather nerve-wrecking. Thankfully, I get to give 2 eulogies – one for the memorial in Australia that has just passed, and the other back in our country of origin.

It’s been such an emotion-suck the whole week, not only because the bawling was firmly squelched in light of pragmatism and the desperate desire not to make this about myself, but the bloody myriad of personalities involved. Funerals, or the lead up to them, are just bursting with writing material. Off the cuff, I can think of at least three caricatures I’ve had to deal with through the week.

1. The Best Friend
   Everyone’s now best friends with the deceased. Even people my cousins and I hardly heard of – and I’ve heard of or met all of her close friends in the 30 years I’ve known her. I am seriously starting to lose count of the number of people who have Facebooked/blogged/emailed/twittered about how devastated they are because of how she/he and the deceased “were so close”. Every time I hear some melodramatic wrist-to-forehead wail about how they were best friends, I feel like saying,” Yeah yeah… you and seven others. Take a number and line up.”
2. The Auntie
   She’s the one who knows best and has a 101 opinions – all unsolicited – about how the accident and death could have been avoided if only everyone had listened to her advice. She’s also the one who takes it upon herself to decide who should be in charge of all arrangements, who’s part of the inner circle that makes the decisions, and who’s extraneous and ought to stop helping out.

   It’s one thing if The Auntie were actually an aunt. It’s quite something else when The Auntie isn’t even related by blood to the deceased. And it really takes the cake when she takes it upon herself to mobilise her sisters in Auntiedom in her absense, so now you have a stereo version of what the hell it is you could have done better and how you need to be a support to the family of the deceased. (The fact that you might be one such member of the family in need of support and comfort doesn’t quite dawn on them, for some reason.) Which makes you really want to take a huge spade, creep up behind all three of them, and…

3. The Best Friend of the Hour
   Unlike The Best Friend and The Auntie, The Best Friend of the Hour actually was close to the deceased during the last years of her life, and is therefore welcomed into the family as one of their own – if only to cling to the last tenuous link between them and the deceased. This is, admittedly, the least annoying caricature because you know their grief is genuine and their help is sincere.

   Unfortunately, if you’re prone to jealousy flaring in times of heartache, you spend a lot of time alternating between loving their company and irrationally dying to yell at them for “taking your place” in the deceased’s life. It gets worse when they actually get the same privileges as you do when it comes to mourning the deceased, and actually succeed in taking over the detail of the funeral arrangements. And suddenly, you wonder if your help is even needed. You know you’re being a petty, self-absorbed cow and you know this hardly should be about you. But a part of you is seething because the Big Shiny Object syndrome is alive and well, and you’re suddenly yesterday’s news.

I’ve really struggled with my inner demons this week – most of all jealousy. And because I cannot stand to ever be seen as either The Best Friend or The Auntie, I sat on these awful, ugly feelings and smiled and smiled like a phlegmatic old maid who just took her happy pills. But they were always there and today, when I couldn’t get to see the body because the hospital/morgue/funeral parlour screwed up, I lost it and cried mightily. And I cried even more because The Best Friends of the Hour could get to see her even before I could. And it was a family privilege I couldn’t bear to bestow, even if it wasn’t mine to give.

Because I was there first. Because I’d always been there. Because she was her absolute self with me – we fought hard, we loved harder. And it’s something I don’t feel I should have to explain to anyone else who knows us, firstly because it all sounds so corny, and secondly because those who really knew us, knew.

I guess the comfort I truly need now is the full recognition of my pain because of my proximity to the deceased. But that’s the trouble with death and funerals, isn’t it. It’s never really for the dead. It’s really all about the ones who are left behind.