I will never forget the drive to the location of the accident. The brilliant leaves, which had made for a magnificent fall in the Hudson Valley, were now skeletons of their former vibrancy, whirling across the road in furious little tornadoes. Their dance was so frenetic; it mirrored my inner grief and turmoil. I knew as I watched them that their image in future years would bring me back to this moment.
The words that had awoken me that morning weren’t even real yet. It felt like I’d arrive in the Rockland County town and see him there, waiting for me and eager to give details about the events of the night before; to explain what had really happened; how I’d somehow gotten the facts all wrong.
As it turned out, none of the facts were wrong. And then it was anxious pacing; it was staring at the ground on the side of the road looking for answers that weren’t there; it was waiting to understand exactly why we were there at all—that small group of us in a mini-caravan, pulling our cars off the road to study the exact spot. Were the stones and broken glass on the edge of the roadway suddenly going to arrange themselves in a verbal explanation of what made this happen? We didn’t realize that being there and not understanding a thing wasn’t going to help at all; it was just the last place in the world where he had existence, and we needed to be there. It was the closest thing we would ever have to being near him again.
I made harried phone calls to the last ones to see him alive, demanding to know everything he said: his mood, his intentions, his reasons, his words—every word—his last actions last decisions last meal last joke last irritation last drink…Last. It was as though knowing every little thing I could possibly learn about those last few hours would replace the sixty or so years together that should have been ahead of us.
* * * * * * *
The first morning of my new life: An early morning shower in my sister’s bright white tiled bathroom. Staring at the wall. Crumpling. Yet somehow I knew to condition after shampooing, and even how to turn the knobs to make the water the right temperature—all the while not forgetting what was ahead of me in that day. Looking back, I don't know how I stepped out of that bathroom to go into it.
The funeral home: The soft-spoken woman seemed scared of the deeply grieving family in front of her, scared to say the wrong thing, and not comprehending their grief. He had been twenty-six; I wondered how old she was. She delicately helped us to write the eulogy for the newspaper.
The cemetery: His would be the next open plot in a row that was working its way slowly down a hill. A hill that overlooked a restaurant supply store, a gas station, a thoroughfare. Just down the road from a special little café where we’d go for buttermilk pancakes and a Reuben, thinking we owned the world. And we had owned the whole world. Our world was ahead of us, and we weren’t foolish enough not to realize that was the greatest place to be. We knew well where we stood in the world, and with each other, there was no question about that.
The flower shop: The book of floral arrangements presented many options. The florist flipped right to the tab separating the section of funeral arrangements. Flowers in the logo of his favorite baseball team, which his brothers chose; the enormous heart of roses, which I chose.
The florist felt that I was making an emotional decision when I placed my order. She gently explained that the arrangement would be just as beautiful with carnations. I don’t think she understood that Ben and I weren’t carnations. We were brilliant, red roses.
I noticed the photos of wedding arrangements in the back of the book and had to leave the shop to cry in the parking lot. My father followed me out, desperate for me to stop hurting, not knowing how to handle this unnavigable version of grief.
The florist gave me a discount on the roses. I later told my sister, “I spent six hundred dollars on red roses for Ben.” She said, “Good for you!” I think she got it.
It is at times like these when you see the good in many people. My co-worker Mary Beth would leave her job at the restaurant where we worked, and drive fifty minutes to bring trays and trays of food for the family, at the direction of the restaurant manager who didn’t give a thought to the food cost. Lauren and her family, whom I hadn’t seen in years, would send flowers and a kind note, as would countless friends and neighbors. My boss would tell me I had a job whenever I was ready to leave the house, and advise me not to take drugs to treat my insomnia.
My sister would let me sleep with her and would cry with me through many nights. My father would time and again stay up through one more movie with me, because I so dreaded the alternative - long, sleepless, and seemingly unending night. My mom could never bear to leave me alone anytime I went somewhere to cry. Yes, these times bring out the good in many people.
Some will try to tell you how to grieve. They think they know what will help you. Ironically, those who think they can help you with their empty words end up filling you with the most dread. None of that helps. Nothing, of what people think should help, actually does.
I would come to learn that those people are really only comforting themselves by fervently convincing themselves that they know they are helping you. In reality what they actually know, after minimal consideration, can be translated into a series of variations on a central theme: total horse-shit. But that is the anger talking.
I would be remiss if I left out...
The Contest: Who loved stronger, knew longer. A woman worked with him when he was a bus-boy at seventeen, a friend of the family had seen him in church since age three, someone else who I’d never before seen or heard him speak of claimed that he was like a son to her…that's funny, I thought. After all, I had only been in his life for two years…I was low on the totem pole of acquaintance, right? It didn’t matter how often we had laughed together, how many hours we'd spent staring into each other’s eyes; didn't matter that we had agreed upon names for our future children, had recently visited a potential venue for our someday wedding. A fantasy.
Of course everyone wants to help, and see you happy and “over it.” I would come to cope with being told what I wanted and didn’t want, being told not to cry, being told that I needed to hold it together for the sake of others, being told I’d get "better," (I guess I was sick?) and being told that it would “pass." This was a time when I didn’t want to get better, and didn’t want it ever to pass. I was told that he was happy now because he was with God, and that I should be happy for him. If they felt that these were the right things to say to me, then these people had either never suffered a loss of any substantial amount or -more likely- they had never been permitted to suffer one. For this I pitied them, and still do.
The thing about this type of exquisite sadness is that in the end, you have your own secret to keep from the world. Now that your other half is gone, no one but you knows about what glimmered temporarily between the two of you. You now have the strength of this experience behind you, and no one knows what you did to come out of that, or how you did it…including yourself. Suffering loss creates an entirely new dimension of who you are; it helps to shape the kind of person you will be from that point on. Life gains perspective, loved ones gain a new level of importance.
But the loss is always there. It doesn’t go away, it just evolves inside you and becomes a part of you. The comfort you can have when looking back -and only when looking back- is that a life without suffering is no life. There is a great love which must come before any suffering, no matter what kind. And this is the thing that must get you through it.
