Blues for Persephone

subtitle: What the fuck did they just say to me?

For a very ling time I knew my life would crumble when my mom died. She was the focus of my life for so long. Even as a little child I worried about her. My poor mom never had the chance to integrate her true self with her lived self and that was through no fault of her own but shortened her life.

She lived for other people. When I was young she was always worried about what every single person would think of us if we did this or said that and how that would impact us. She would never have said this but she truly believed that if you stay still and quiet the monsters will stop hurting you and go away. Her advice to me about kids who were cruel to me at school was to not react at all (freeze) and then they would get bored and move on to another person because they would get nothing from me.

It turns out that doesn’t work. It never worked for her, not when she was molested by someone she should have been able to trust, not when she was treated like she was not worth as much as other people, not when she lived in fear of my father for most of my life.

As she grew older, she started to say things she wished she could internalize and wished she could do. She gave wonderful advice but found herself unable to make it real in her own life. The more I learned about psychology, trauma, grief, and resilience the more I taught her about how to help herself find some safe space within her mind. It didn’t really work. She was just too afraid.

The saddest thing, for me alone, about it was that she so very desperately wanted to see me happy. She wanted to see me working a job I loved, living a life in a supportive community, and with someone who loved me especially dearly. She never got to see that. She died still worried about me, knowing I was alone in the world but for her and that I might not be ok. That breaks my heart.

So, that being said, what happens after someone you love dies is that you have to make some choices about their remains, the ceremony, the location, the after party, etc…

I recommend that you not do what I did.

I organized a ceremony and after party for everyone but myself. Not surprisingly, the majority of the attendees didn’t give a single shit about me and how I was coping. I appreciate the people who came up to me and asked how I was doing with genuine concern. They were few and far between.

I also appreciated the people (blood relatives) who sat with me and laughed and talked about a lot of nothing. Though it was crushing that, unlike the funerals we’ve had for male members of the family, there was not the drinking and crying and laughing and telling stories about my mom. Maybe it was precisely because her life was so sad or maybe my family really doesn’t care about its women. At this point, I know I can do nothing about it so it really doesn’t matter.

Some of the attendees had an invitation only party without us.

It took me months to process that.

While my family was sitting in a hotel lobby (because I forgot to reserve a suite while working an unforgiving job, struggling with my own health issues, and managing my poor little dog’s disc disease… that’s what happens when you’re alone in the world, balls drop) some other folks were comfortably in a house. Did I mention we weren’t invited? We weren’t.

So that’s what happens after. A lot of business happens, with a lot of phone calls and mistakes. I imagine it would have been better if I hadn’t been doing it mostly alone but who knows.

And then the services happen. I hope that no one tells you to behave yourself when someone you love dies. That shouldn’t happen to anyone.