Life: It's All We Have

Articles

Holly Winter
Living The Life Of Holly

Life: It's All We Have
Aug 8, 2003

Thankfully my first thought didn’t leak out. So often with me those first thoughts are given a seemingly flippant voice as I thoughtlessly chatter about the ridiculous workings of my mind. But. This one didn’t escape. How inappropriate would that have been?

I walked into the funeral home and saw her laying in the coffin. And. My first thought was, “Hey. Look. She’s here. We found her! She was here all along.”

Thank god that thought didn’t leak out.

Her three children were already there. Her seventeen year old son was crouched next to his mother’s coffin crying uncontrollably. Her twenty one year old daughter was next to him, holding on with one arm while she cried softly. Her twenty year old son stood back watching.

Her x-husband, the grandparents and I had ridden there together. I had no intention of being a part of this first, private viewing. I was at the wrong place at the wrong time when I happened to stop by the house to welcome the grandparents into town. Right after I arrived, the call came.

“The funeral home is ready for the family viewing.” Her x announced as he hung up the phone.

“Ok. I’m leaving. Just stopped by for a quick hello.” I said, walking backwards for the door as fast as I could.

“Absolutely not.” The grandmother said. “We need you there. You’re going.”

“No thanks. I’d love to. But. I have writing to do.”

“You’re a part of this, too.” She insisted, applying fresh lipstick.

“Sorry. Can’t do it.” I said, sadly. And. I wasn’t lying. The last thing I could stand to do was go and see her dressed in that outfit I helped Amy pick out. I couldn’t bear it. Nope. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t go.

The grandmother gave me a hard stare through the mirror. “The children need you there.”

The children? The children whom I placed on the top of my list of favorite kids in the whole world? “Ok.” I said meekly. “I’m going.”

I walked over to the twenty year old and put my arm around him. He put his head on my shoulder. Little tears were streaming down his face. “She’s in a better place.” He whispered.

“Yes. She is.” My tears were flowing freely.

The grandmother moved to the two children by the coffin. She held them tightly as they sobbed. The younger son kept crying, “Mommy, mommy, mommy…” as he tapped his head gently against the coffin.

The father cried as he moved to hug his younger son. “I don’t know why. But she loved you very much. You know she loved you very much.”

“I know she did.” He sobbed.

The grandfather sat in a chair. “This is the saddest day. Everyone wants to know why. Why did she kill herself? Nobody understands. Nobody will ever know. We just have to move on.”

The three children were drinking in the last view of their mother. The mother that they called or hung out with every day. The mother who was best friends with her sisters. The mother who had a husband who was desperately in love with her. The mother who had a number of successful businesses. The mother who had just started a new prescription drug. Um. Could this have been an awful side effect? They were memorizing how she looked. The clothes Amy had chosen for her. The expression on her face.

Amy started wailing. “THAT’S NOT MY MOM. SHE DIDN’T LOOK LIKE THAT. THAT’S NOT MY MOM.”

The grandmother looked to me then grabbed her granddaughter who was staring open mouthed at the coffin. “Honey. What’s wrong?” It was very important to all of us that every part of this process met with the approval of the children.

“That’s doesn’t look like her.” She moaned. “It doesn’t look like her skin. Or the way she held her head. It just doesn’t look like her.”

Her grandmother’s didn’t know what to say. She threw her arms around Amy and turned to me.

I sighed. “I’m glad that you noticed that. I’m glad that you noticed that that doesn’t look like your mother. I’m glad you that noticed, because that isn’t your mother anymore.” I waited a moment to collect my thoughts and stop babbling.

I softened my voice. “That’s the body your mother left behind. They had to use make-up to give it some color. That’s why the skin’s the wrong color. But the part of that body that made your mother who she was is long gone. That part left two days ago.”

The kids were all staring at her body nodding their heads in agreement.

“That’s the body she left behind. You mother’s in heaven.” I continued.

The older boy whispered to me. “She’s in a better place now.”

“I sure hope so.” I whispered back with a wink.

He laughed through his tears as he stood looking at her empty body. “Do you think heaven’s a good place?”

“Yes.” I answered. “I believe that with every ounce of my being. Heaven is a very good place. You have a very beautiful angel watching you from heaven now.”

He nodded and slipped his arm around me. He nodded again. “A better place.”

I sighed and turned to the children. “Why don’t you touch her body? It will feel strange. Cold. Waxy. Why don’t you?”

Her daughter rubbed her arm. “It feels funny.” She announced through her tears.

The younger son poked at her hand. “She’s all hard.”

The older boy held her hand for a moment. “It’s cold.” He smiled.

The grandmother gathered all of us around her. “I want you to listen to me.” She said. “I don’t know why this happened and I’m not going to pretend to understand it, because I don’t. What I do know is that we’re all going to stick together and become stronger. We are going to lean on each other. We are going to ask each other for help.”

She waited a moment then continued. “Sometimes you’re going to be really sad. And that’s ok. You need to feel that. And you are going to have to reach out to others when you are feeling that way. Your mother didn’t reach out when she was sad. We need to learn from her mistake.”

We all nodded in agreement. We would learn from this mistake.

The next day her children would host the party they had helped to plan through sobbing tears. Their mother’s funeral. They stood out front as they greeted her friends, family, and co-workers.

“Thanks for coming.” They said, stiffly.

“We’re doing fine.”

“Yes. We do look good in black.”

The youngest son would read an original piece he wrote about what an incredible mother his mom was to all of his friends and his brother and sister and himself. He would make everyone laugh and cry when he pointed out that his favorite hairdresser was gone and marvel at the irony of standing in front of us, on one of the most important days of his life, in need of a haircut.

And. Then. He asked that people not remember his mother for the way she ended her life. Rather he wanted her to be remembered for the she LIVED her life and for the many incredible things that she had done for each of us there.

It was a stunning realization to wake up to her son’s request. That we dwell on the good in his mother. He needed that for his memories. He and his brother and his sister deserved that. They deserved to be surrounded by the many wonderful memories that she had spent her whole life carefully crafting.

Life. It’s all we have.

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About the author: Holly Winter is an adventurer who has become known for sprinkling humor through her extraordinary life that continues to entertain the many thousands of fans here at Useless-Knowledge.com. Whether she is giving advice to the new mayor of Denver, swimming with sting rays at the Cayman Islands, or dealing with the side effects of her epilepsy medication, you will find her positive take on the world to be the perfect accompaniment to each and every part of your week. Look for Holly’s columns every Saturday. Be sure to sign up for an e-mail reminder when her column has been posted at her Yahoo Group where a photo will be posted that goes along with the column. Send a blank e-mail to livingthelifeofholly-subscribe@yahoogroups.com You can contact Holly at her website Livingthelifeofholly.com or email: Holly@livingthelifeofholly.com

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