I was sitting on the passenger seat of my father’s 21-year-old Toyota HiAce van. The radio played bad pop songs that I always carefully ignore, in fear of them settling into my mind. My father was driving and I lounged, looking out onto open fields, sometimes surprised by open water, always amazed at birds flying by.
And for the first time in my life, I asked him what it had been like to lose the mother of his child. It was a thought that had not occurred to me in the years since the incident had happened, years in which I, feeling somewhat lost and losing, had focused so intently on my loss that I had hardly ever stood still to think of what it must have been like for others.
“It was two-sided,” he said. We dug deep, and he spilled out what his life changed into when she was gone so suddenly. He had let go part of himself in this, his regular risk-taking in sports was no longer appropriate. “Because I could not let you lose both parents. I stopped doing certain things because I just couldn’t risk it.” (This, to me, is the most profound definition of parental love that I have heard yet.)
We had an hour, so we talked for an hour. We flowed from the pain of loss to its lessons. You see, as a five-year-old, Death became something like an acquaintance to me. Five years later, someone fell again. Five years after that another. This time frame seemed to be enjoyed by the Reaper, so he remained punctual. From all those losses, I am certain I have cried a hundred times, and yet they made me stronger than before. There are lessons I have derived from losing my mother, ways in which I have grown, that would not have happened other wise. Or at least not until years, possibly decades, later.
To be subject to resistance of any kind is to be given the opportunity to grow. It is the handing of two choices: either you wallow ceaselessly and slowly wither away into almost-nothingness, or you take a stern, objective look and choose to grow.
My mother’s passing away bereaved me of a portion of my childhood. “I was so sad to see you growing up so quickly. I hoped you would be bad, just for once, but you weren’t. It broke my heart,” my dad uttered when he recalled what it had all been like all that time ago.
What it gave me, however, was a love for being alone. I gained independence, not because I chose it, but because I had to fence for myself in certain ways, so as not to fall behind.
The importance of living today, rather than waiting for a nice tomorrow, is what I know to be true. I have seen what waiting can do to you, and I can tell you that there is nothing more heartbreaking than knowing how beautiful a life could have been if only some chances had been taken.
Some days, the knowledge that Death has taught me lessons is not enough. Sometimes my heart breaks all over again when I think of moments lost, and I let my emotions take over and cry until I am all dried up. Because even when I hold progress deep in my heart and believe that to live is to grow, it can feel as though my weighted soul will shatter me. So, I am not here to tell you that you should always feel strong even though you have been through so much, but what might help is to honour what has happened and what it has taught you. Burn your candles, listen to your music, look at your photos, pour out your emotions and know that it’s all because of love.
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There is a Dutch song, written by Youp van ‘t Hek, that was played at my mother’s funeral. It is called ‘Niemand Weet Hoe Laat Het Is,’ and in my most careful translation, this is part of the chorus:
“No one knows how late it is,
So we should dance,
And we should make love,
We should laugh and drink,
Filled with fire.
Love, hold me,
because I am here now.”
To know that waiting for tomorrow does not provide you with anything other than short-term ease is one way to ensure, to our best ability, that life will have some sort of meaning. And if not for that, then it is at least a way to honour the ones who have gone too soon.