When I was little, my family seemed so average. So when I was 12, and my dad told us he was gay and my parents were getting divorced, instead of grief, I thought: “oh my family is actually different! This is interesting!” Then when I was 16, he told us he was HIV+ and I felt fear but not necessarily grief. Finally, when I was 22, he took his life (prefaced by years of pulling away). The heart wrenching Tim Rice lyric comes to mind, “You've even gone a bit too far to get the message home.” Could we start again, please?
I remember shock but I’ll tell you, rather than an instant, crash-to-your-knees wail, the grief became a 20-year ragged whimper bouncing around in a cave of my own making. Because this: “I once fell in love with my own woundedness, and I would keep the wounds fresh just to keep licking them.” I became 100% addicted to the puzzle, the why, and the complexity. And whenever a friend’s father passed, you better believe I’d crack open that book again and read it cover to cover, trying to compare notes, find loopholes, scratch that interminable itch. But what if I traveled back to the young wisdom of 12-year-old Katie? I think by “different than” I actually meant “the same as”… I felt like I finally *belonged* to the human race of suffering. I wish I had held on tighter to that insight.
The biggest paradox of humanity is that we all want so desperately to be unique and special because it means that we matter, we BELONG, we aren’t discarded into the bin of boring, we don’t fade into the background of the unnoticed. Yet then, by brandishing our suffering like a membership card, we stay stuck in our trauma. Addicted to the unique wound, we shun healing that could truly embrace us into the fold. We’re told it’s bad etiquette to bring up our own history of suffering when someone else is in it… but what if that’s exactly the hand we need to pull us out of our isolated echo pain chamber?
Per usual, you got me waxing poetic over here, but reading your insightful HIGHLY intelligent books and essays on grief have been pivotal in my healing my own “grief baby” over the past several years. So thank you for allowing me to get down on the ground, sprawl out with my notes and my string map, and work it out in the comment section ❤️
Second, did Alison Bechdel just...steal your life? It seems like you should get a hefty cut of royalties for the various adaptations of Fun Home just for your camaraderie, including the future movie starring one Jake Gyllenhaal as the dad (is he old enough to be the dad of a college student?! I thought he was 17, still trapped in October Sky)--I will be SEATED for that one!!!!
Third, my gut has been thoroughly punched by this reflection which is actually a sermon, getting at the very bottom of the Tibetan Singing Bowl that is humanity. It's a much richer version of an email from an old boyfriend that always really stuck with me:
"i never quite click with any group or subgroup, culture or subculture, i always wind up the odd one out, even in the groups of odd ones out. it is the theme of my fugue. i know the quest, i know the feeling, and i know the road. i keep wishing there is some truth to the whole thing about roads and rome, but i think i also know that there isn't. some of us are drifters and wanderers; content in the unfamiliar; happily longing for roots, but ironically too attached to the roaming to properly grow some; claiming cafes hoping that the barista will remember our names but leaving as soon as that happens."
(This was when we all wrote in lowercase?? A sweet relic of early internet)
I liked it so much I asked if I could quote it for my second book, which might be why it sounded intelligent--he was one of those high-IQ, "there is only one intelligence" types!!
Fourth, I only realized after writing this how addicted I really was to the uniqueness of my situation, and how a fog was suddenly (like, truly, instantaneously) lifted when I realized two things simultaneously:
1) Anyone who knew my dad very well probably had a tough or at least complicated relationship with him
2) MANY people have weird relationships with their parents, dead or otherwise
For how many years I've clung to the NOBODY UNDERSTANDS ME refrain, the clarity of these two things gave me a shiver of peace. Like they had literally never occurred to me before. I'm still not 100% sure that grief is as universal as Nick Cave graciously says; I am instantly resentful when I realize how many people have gotten to 60 without significant loss or physical pain. But there is definitely universality in complex (to say the least) dads (as the ex-boyfriend in this particular newsletter once posited, "Why does Father's Day exist? Nobody has a good dad!" and the unique-belonging push-and-pull of life.
Fifth, but if all of that led me to this exact comment conversation right here, I wouldn't change it. It is the biggest honor to receive the depth of your soul right here in the comments on my dirty laptop screen in a cafe playing 'Fantastic Voyage' while I lick a vanilla cupcake's frosting with my finger (hence the dirty laptop).
Oh my friggin GOODNESS!! I had to open up a draft email to give my words some breathing room because all this synchronicity took my breath away... I am spinning at the bottom of the Tibetan Singing Bowl that is humanity!!
1. And a happy JCS Season to you! I hope your Triduum weekend is filled with emotions of all flavors and depths!
2. HOW DID I NOT KNOW Alison Bechdel?!?! I'm so behind in life! I just watched a youtube video review/analysis of Fun Home, and I'm blown away because AHHHHH I TOO am drawing a comic thing influenced by all my dad stuff (only my avatar is a skeletonish dude named Toby and only a hint of autobiographical). And similar to Alison, I'm packing it with a bunch of easter eggies (of the pop culture, Tarot, religious, and philosophical persuasion). THIS IS WILD. Thank you for mentioning it, I need to dive into this stat! (Meanwhile there's no way Jake Gyllenhaal is not still Donnie Darko in high school!!!)
But 3. *I* was gut-punched by your old boyfriend's email with the classic lowercase (Live Journal memories for me!). So my biggest struggle with my writing/comic project is the end. I just can't seem to write an end that has Toby happily "find his tribe" and live happily ever after because *I* feel like "a misfit among misfits" and I know that I'll probably always feel that way. So how will it end not crushingly sad, but more like pensively satisfying? So when I read this email snippet: "...content in the unfamiliar; happily longing for roots, but ironically too attached to the roaming to properly grow some..." I'm like yesssss, see?? It's a thing!! So you mentioning this is clearly just another breadcrumb I need to follow EXACERBATED by the synchronistic fact that you asked him if you could quote it in your book, and, perhaps I have already mentioned this in passing, but I admittedly lifted your "The role of the chaplain is to hold hands in the dark..." chaplain quote for the High Priestess/Chaplain card in my story. Yada yada, should I ever finish this project and do something with it twelve years from now, expect a knock on your door?
4. I am awash with joy over your two-pronged clarity bomb. It's sort of one of those "once you see, you can't unsee" experiences too, which helps SO MUCH. And I'll tell you what: after READING this piece of yours, it was like I finally felt as though I had an ally on this super weird journey. (And probably have millions of allies... if only we would all just talk about it more openly like YOU have here!)
And full-circle 5. Of course this sweet nectar of an exchange is laced with "Fantastic Voyage" and vanilla cupcake frosting. Of course!!
Here I was assuming we were the Sisterhood of the Traveling Bechdel!! But of course we WERE, just not in the rules of time or space (who needs 'em!?)!
The book (which I can't WAIT for you to get in your hot little hands and appreciate the parallels and differences between your two thoughtful, complex, brilliant minds) was 90000% responsible for my entire career (thanks...Alison's dad...??) and I was lucky enough to get to see the musical on Broadway on my Dead-Dad-iversary (thanks God, and some rich producer). No matter how many times I'd listened to 'Telephone Wire,' (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_US4P9zPQQ) sung from Adult Alison's perspective grasping to recall the last convo she had with her dad before she went back to college and he stood in front of a truck, I wasn't prepared for how moving it would be while performed (one lonely paltry Tiktok gives a sense of the staging https://www.tiktok.com/@broadwayandbeyond/video/6853055719890029829) Maybe some day take a long-ass walk and listen to the whole thing? SORRY I'M SUCH AN ANNOYING THEATER KID (can you be a theater kid if you never did theater because you can't act or sing?). ANYWAY, needless to say, I cannot wait for Toby The Musical and will happily produce it with my felt fortune.
I am smiling ear to ear about your "quote" "lifting" because I have a very good memory for words but very bad memory for sources, so there have been close to ten million times when I've straight-up, like, transcribed a Mary Oliver poem on Instagram thinking I wrote it (because it's in my head!!!) and someone will be like, "Uhhh....cite the source, ma'am?" and I'm like MY BAD, and I'm just waiting for someone to send me a cease-and-desist about doing this in a book or two. That's why I never get remotely upset when anyone shares stuff without credit...aren't we doing that all day every day with songs in our head and misattributed Mark Twain idioms anyway?? Just really had to share that.
Synchronicity is the BEST!!!!!! I'm so happy it visited us both!
No freakin way, Mari. I just listened and it's absolutely wild. When we were HS-age, my dad used to pick us up from Milwaukee to take us to his apt in Madison. And the hour-and-a-half drive felt exactly like this song (different subject matter/theme, but precisely the same sentiment). In college, I even did a painting of the inside of his car reflecting upon this time. (Admittedly, I appreciated the drives where Broadway filled in the silence. So. Much. Rent.) Needless to say, the song + the paltry Tiktok = me --> 😭 And I feel seen. So NOPE... you KNOW me and you can be the (not)annoying theater kid all day every day!! I also feel like I'm swaddled in the fabric of the universe because the book was 90000% responsible for your career. These threads, man, they are HERE for us!! They'll weave together and hold us if we find them (and we let them). And why NOT occasionally pilfer and remix the threads?? We crave patterns. We learn when old ideas are repackaged and shared. Steal like an artist!
2. Whenever seemingly-random threads come together Cat's-Cradle-style, it makes me wonder which seemingly-random threads of my life might make sense 15 years from now (when I'm still blogging on a hologram from space or whatever). Gives me so much hope for life!!
Thank you for your gorgeous reflection. Particularly the part about the desire to rank grief against others. I lost both of my beautiful parents while in my late 30’s/early 40’s and I won’t lie, I’m furious with friends that don’t grasp the depth of these losses/don’t check in/don’t get it. It feels so profoundly unfair but I am just alchemizing these losses earlier than most.
Ugh, Melissa, I'm so so sorry. DANG. I remember being in my 20s, a bit after my father died, sitting at a table with some co-workers who were all in their 50s. One of them said, "You know, we're starting to get to the age where we're realizing that our parents are getting older." Even at the time I thought, "GETTING TO THE AGE?" But another piped up: "If you're realizing that now, you've been very lucky."
Losing parents sucks, any time. I was preoccupied by jealous rage for a few months because I realized my friend's mom was almost 70 and still hadn't lost either of her parents!! I just couldn't get over how unfair it seemed. But you're so right; you are processing something that others are bracing themselves to process, possibly at a time when, in a way, it's harder. Harder and easier. Who knows.
And the loss of parents being witnesses, or bearers of family information, really hit me. I really, really feel for you, and I'm sending you looootttssss of love.
Thank you so much for this Mari. Last February I lost someone who the world knew as my “aunt” but was truly a third parent that raised me and was one of my biggest support systems in my life. I really resonate with the complicated grief feelings - and especially the frustration of feeling like others around you who haven’t lost someone of that magnitude just don’t get it. I want to scream from the mountains on a near daily basis that she wasn’t *just* an aunt, and feel like I almost need to justify my grief to people who don’t understand the extent or our relationship. It’s such a hard thing to navigate even now that I’m a year into it. Your illustrations really struck a chord. I so appreciate you sharing.
Oh Julia!! I so get that! Last year, whenever I told any acquaintance that my stepdad died, they'd immediately ask about my mom and just basically ignore me. At some point, I just started saying he was my dad, because most didn't know "the truth," and it felt more true to me. It's so hard to explain how large these losses really are!! And we shouldn't have to...but it's interesting how society really does rank them (even though we all know it's complicated!).
I'm so so sorry you lost your precious amazing beautiful aunt. You deserve to grieve an entire ocean over her. I pray you have people in your life who really *get it* and don't need any more explanation than that. Sending love <3
When my late husband Jay died in the our hospital I came home and immediately dropped to the ground in front of the angel canvas he had bought for our home. Supplication. Position of crying and release. May you find peace as you experience this heart rendering loss Mari.
Dearest Sherry, my heart breaks for you. I'm so sorry to hear about Jay. What a horror to come home, to find yourself alone, with just the ground to support you. Supplication is really all that we can possibly muster in those unbelievable and unbearable moments. Sending lots of love on what I'm sure is an ongoing grief journey with lots of crying and release xoxoxo
Thank you Mari. This was 16 years ago! I recall it like yesterday. Fortunately I have done a lot of grief processing (I am a therapist and a bereavement trauma specialist) and wrote a book about it so I am doingwell and experiencing a lot of growth. Of course at times I still acutely miss Jay and our life together while also feeling gratitude for everything I have in my life now. The loss you write about is so very recent and would be so raw I am sure. Sending you lots of love. XOXOXO
16 years or 16 seconds, grief has no timeline, right!!? My friend lost her mom 22 years ago and swears it was yesterday. Or maybe 200 years ago. I'm going to look for your book!!!
You are so kind. It never has a timeline. It never goes away. We move forward yet we do not move on. One quote that has really helped me with grief over time is this one from Mary Oliver: "Someone I once loved gave me a box full of darkness. It took me years to discover that this too was a gift." I ponder this quote every day and what it may mean. The book - "Sweet Sorrow: Finding Enduring Wholeness after Loss and Grief." XOXOXOXOXO to you as you continue to heal from this gut wrenching loss.......
Thank you for this, though I'm sorry you have to bear the pain. We can lose everything BUT the ground under us, and your words have helped me see that.
Oh man, you're so right about that. The ground IS the only thing that won't leave us (scary and comforting)! Interesting how we describe big shocking losses as "the ground falling beneath our feet." It's as though the completely unimaginable becomes real.
Mari, this is so beautiful and resonant. I have found my grief to be incredibly selfish and shameful at times and you so beautifully articulated that experience with grace and loving. Thank you. Also, if you haven’t read it, I highly recommend Martín Prechtel’s “The Smell of Rain on Dust.” It has helped me through the past several years of intense grief. I am so sorry about your friend. 🤍
Oh my gosh Carla, you've made such a good point--I am SUCH a selfish griever!!! And quite self-destructive!! I have often longed to be more graceful and gracious at it, like those beautiful paintings of widows draped beautifully over a mahogany casket. Alas, catch me binge-watching TV with a big scoop of ice cream in my mouth at all times.
Buying that book immediately!!! Thank you so much!
Absolutely. I wonder how much the narratives of grief will change with upcoming generations as families look so different and friendships become more important. I hope it will become a much more inclusive and less-taboo topic!
Mari, you are wise beyond words. Thank you for having the courage to explore and share your journey into the hidden recesses of grief, a subject that often remains cloaked in silence but is nevertheless painfully endured in powerless solitude. In your sharing, you are helping others to see that they too can look down upon the grief they are experiencing in an enabling way.
Oh Margaret, you knew just what to say. Thank you SO so much. Of course I went back and forth, editing and thinking about not publishing this one; the whole thing just felt too dark and weird and hard to post. I really needed to hear that <3 Thank you xoxo
Mari, your meandering journey through life with such stirring and oftentimes delightful awareness, speaks volumes not only in your words, but in your drawings and handwritten outpourings as well.
And yes even grief, which can be profoundly challenging in so many ways, can also be seen as meaningful and beautiful as the pain of loss abates. I say this because grief arises from the loss of something or someone we truly cared for and valued, and there is beauty in this. And while over time we can recover significantly from grief, it does provide us with the much needed time it takes to learn and grow emotionally as we work to find our way forward into new and unfamiliar terrain, a world without the person you came to love and care for.
Thank you Mari, for daring to be you, caring and sharing all the while!
I'll be savoring your words for my next grief-bomb. You are so, so right. Grief is an infant stage where we are discovering a whole new world. Even when we take our first wobbly steps, that's still grief. You are so wise!
Certain feedback just goes straight to my heart without any filter, and yours really got there today. I was feeling insecure about a whole spread of things, but you've helped me to see life as I see it :) Thank you so, so much.
I resonate with this, especially your grief "memories" basket drawing and your list of grief stages. Also Nick Cave's formulation, and yours, that we are born into grief, complete (incomplete) with a sense of lostness, of loss, of yearning.
Accepting the "fact" of yearning as a constant in life has been such a transformative experience for me, and yet I have to remind myself of it every day!! I'm still so attached to getting my way, even when I know that this could all change/disappear at any moment. Phewf, being a human!!!
A very beautifully designed message—a canvas where you could paint with the colors of your choice, at the time of your choice, and for the people who are important to you.
This is how grief conversations should be—open, deep but wide, something that embraces new ways to build the dialogue. I loved every part of the story—thank you for doing it.
This post has been sitting in my inbox, waiting for the right moment to read. it is so so so beautiful and so you and so true. So many losses over the years and the one consistent thread i've seen is the destructive power of playing the game of who hurts the most. It's so empty and pointless and hurtful and yet the game everyone tends to immediately jump into. I love thinking about the floor, where we all belong. Can't wait to listen to this nick cave interview. wish i had more time to write but i love you! thank you for sharing!!
Thank you for sharing your writing and your grief. It helps to read about other people's grief. My 10 year old daughter died last year and I suppose this should be a straightforward grief. The grief is mine to take, she is and was my child. Yet, even though this is true, it still feels complicated. She suffered a lot (she had a brain tumour) and there is an element of relief that she is no longer suffering. But this complicates my grief. How can I be sad that she has died, if the alternative, her being alive, meant so much sorrow and pain for her? It is complicated in different ways to the complicated grief that you write about, yet even so, it doesn't feel as simple as I might have once imagined that it would feel, to lose your child. I have been writing about my grief, trying to make sense of it all, though aware it is possible that I can't make sense of it. I expected to be on the floor and in fact, that would feel reassuring, to be on the floor with my grief and tears and sorrow. Yet I am not and somehow, this bothers me. Instead, I am just tired.
When I was little, my family seemed so average. So when I was 12, and my dad told us he was gay and my parents were getting divorced, instead of grief, I thought: “oh my family is actually different! This is interesting!” Then when I was 16, he told us he was HIV+ and I felt fear but not necessarily grief. Finally, when I was 22, he took his life (prefaced by years of pulling away). The heart wrenching Tim Rice lyric comes to mind, “You've even gone a bit too far to get the message home.” Could we start again, please?
I remember shock but I’ll tell you, rather than an instant, crash-to-your-knees wail, the grief became a 20-year ragged whimper bouncing around in a cave of my own making. Because this: “I once fell in love with my own woundedness, and I would keep the wounds fresh just to keep licking them.” I became 100% addicted to the puzzle, the why, and the complexity. And whenever a friend’s father passed, you better believe I’d crack open that book again and read it cover to cover, trying to compare notes, find loopholes, scratch that interminable itch. But what if I traveled back to the young wisdom of 12-year-old Katie? I think by “different than” I actually meant “the same as”… I felt like I finally *belonged* to the human race of suffering. I wish I had held on tighter to that insight.
The biggest paradox of humanity is that we all want so desperately to be unique and special because it means that we matter, we BELONG, we aren’t discarded into the bin of boring, we don’t fade into the background of the unnoticed. Yet then, by brandishing our suffering like a membership card, we stay stuck in our trauma. Addicted to the unique wound, we shun healing that could truly embrace us into the fold. We’re told it’s bad etiquette to bring up our own history of suffering when someone else is in it… but what if that’s exactly the hand we need to pull us out of our isolated echo pain chamber?
Per usual, you got me waxing poetic over here, but reading your insightful HIGHLY intelligent books and essays on grief have been pivotal in my healing my own “grief baby” over the past several years. So thank you for allowing me to get down on the ground, sprawl out with my notes and my string map, and work it out in the comment section ❤️
First, Happy Jesus Christ SuperStar Season!
Second, did Alison Bechdel just...steal your life? It seems like you should get a hefty cut of royalties for the various adaptations of Fun Home just for your camaraderie, including the future movie starring one Jake Gyllenhaal as the dad (is he old enough to be the dad of a college student?! I thought he was 17, still trapped in October Sky)--I will be SEATED for that one!!!!
Third, my gut has been thoroughly punched by this reflection which is actually a sermon, getting at the very bottom of the Tibetan Singing Bowl that is humanity. It's a much richer version of an email from an old boyfriend that always really stuck with me:
"i never quite click with any group or subgroup, culture or subculture, i always wind up the odd one out, even in the groups of odd ones out. it is the theme of my fugue. i know the quest, i know the feeling, and i know the road. i keep wishing there is some truth to the whole thing about roads and rome, but i think i also know that there isn't. some of us are drifters and wanderers; content in the unfamiliar; happily longing for roots, but ironically too attached to the roaming to properly grow some; claiming cafes hoping that the barista will remember our names but leaving as soon as that happens."
(This was when we all wrote in lowercase?? A sweet relic of early internet)
I liked it so much I asked if I could quote it for my second book, which might be why it sounded intelligent--he was one of those high-IQ, "there is only one intelligence" types!!
Fourth, I only realized after writing this how addicted I really was to the uniqueness of my situation, and how a fog was suddenly (like, truly, instantaneously) lifted when I realized two things simultaneously:
1) Anyone who knew my dad very well probably had a tough or at least complicated relationship with him
2) MANY people have weird relationships with their parents, dead or otherwise
For how many years I've clung to the NOBODY UNDERSTANDS ME refrain, the clarity of these two things gave me a shiver of peace. Like they had literally never occurred to me before. I'm still not 100% sure that grief is as universal as Nick Cave graciously says; I am instantly resentful when I realize how many people have gotten to 60 without significant loss or physical pain. But there is definitely universality in complex (to say the least) dads (as the ex-boyfriend in this particular newsletter once posited, "Why does Father's Day exist? Nobody has a good dad!" and the unique-belonging push-and-pull of life.
Fifth, but if all of that led me to this exact comment conversation right here, I wouldn't change it. It is the biggest honor to receive the depth of your soul right here in the comments on my dirty laptop screen in a cafe playing 'Fantastic Voyage' while I lick a vanilla cupcake's frosting with my finger (hence the dirty laptop).
Oh my friggin GOODNESS!! I had to open up a draft email to give my words some breathing room because all this synchronicity took my breath away... I am spinning at the bottom of the Tibetan Singing Bowl that is humanity!!
1. And a happy JCS Season to you! I hope your Triduum weekend is filled with emotions of all flavors and depths!
2. HOW DID I NOT KNOW Alison Bechdel?!?! I'm so behind in life! I just watched a youtube video review/analysis of Fun Home, and I'm blown away because AHHHHH I TOO am drawing a comic thing influenced by all my dad stuff (only my avatar is a skeletonish dude named Toby and only a hint of autobiographical). And similar to Alison, I'm packing it with a bunch of easter eggies (of the pop culture, Tarot, religious, and philosophical persuasion). THIS IS WILD. Thank you for mentioning it, I need to dive into this stat! (Meanwhile there's no way Jake Gyllenhaal is not still Donnie Darko in high school!!!)
But 3. *I* was gut-punched by your old boyfriend's email with the classic lowercase (Live Journal memories for me!). So my biggest struggle with my writing/comic project is the end. I just can't seem to write an end that has Toby happily "find his tribe" and live happily ever after because *I* feel like "a misfit among misfits" and I know that I'll probably always feel that way. So how will it end not crushingly sad, but more like pensively satisfying? So when I read this email snippet: "...content in the unfamiliar; happily longing for roots, but ironically too attached to the roaming to properly grow some..." I'm like yesssss, see?? It's a thing!! So you mentioning this is clearly just another breadcrumb I need to follow EXACERBATED by the synchronistic fact that you asked him if you could quote it in your book, and, perhaps I have already mentioned this in passing, but I admittedly lifted your "The role of the chaplain is to hold hands in the dark..." chaplain quote for the High Priestess/Chaplain card in my story. Yada yada, should I ever finish this project and do something with it twelve years from now, expect a knock on your door?
4. I am awash with joy over your two-pronged clarity bomb. It's sort of one of those "once you see, you can't unsee" experiences too, which helps SO MUCH. And I'll tell you what: after READING this piece of yours, it was like I finally felt as though I had an ally on this super weird journey. (And probably have millions of allies... if only we would all just talk about it more openly like YOU have here!)
And full-circle 5. Of course this sweet nectar of an exchange is laced with "Fantastic Voyage" and vanilla cupcake frosting. Of course!!
Here I was assuming we were the Sisterhood of the Traveling Bechdel!! But of course we WERE, just not in the rules of time or space (who needs 'em!?)!
The book (which I can't WAIT for you to get in your hot little hands and appreciate the parallels and differences between your two thoughtful, complex, brilliant minds) was 90000% responsible for my entire career (thanks...Alison's dad...??) and I was lucky enough to get to see the musical on Broadway on my Dead-Dad-iversary (thanks God, and some rich producer). No matter how many times I'd listened to 'Telephone Wire,' (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_US4P9zPQQ) sung from Adult Alison's perspective grasping to recall the last convo she had with her dad before she went back to college and he stood in front of a truck, I wasn't prepared for how moving it would be while performed (one lonely paltry Tiktok gives a sense of the staging https://www.tiktok.com/@broadwayandbeyond/video/6853055719890029829) Maybe some day take a long-ass walk and listen to the whole thing? SORRY I'M SUCH AN ANNOYING THEATER KID (can you be a theater kid if you never did theater because you can't act or sing?). ANYWAY, needless to say, I cannot wait for Toby The Musical and will happily produce it with my felt fortune.
I am smiling ear to ear about your "quote" "lifting" because I have a very good memory for words but very bad memory for sources, so there have been close to ten million times when I've straight-up, like, transcribed a Mary Oliver poem on Instagram thinking I wrote it (because it's in my head!!!) and someone will be like, "Uhhh....cite the source, ma'am?" and I'm like MY BAD, and I'm just waiting for someone to send me a cease-and-desist about doing this in a book or two. That's why I never get remotely upset when anyone shares stuff without credit...aren't we doing that all day every day with songs in our head and misattributed Mark Twain idioms anyway?? Just really had to share that.
Synchronicity is the BEST!!!!!! I'm so happy it visited us both!
No freakin way, Mari. I just listened and it's absolutely wild. When we were HS-age, my dad used to pick us up from Milwaukee to take us to his apt in Madison. And the hour-and-a-half drive felt exactly like this song (different subject matter/theme, but precisely the same sentiment). In college, I even did a painting of the inside of his car reflecting upon this time. (Admittedly, I appreciated the drives where Broadway filled in the silence. So. Much. Rent.) Needless to say, the song + the paltry Tiktok = me --> 😭 And I feel seen. So NOPE... you KNOW me and you can be the (not)annoying theater kid all day every day!! I also feel like I'm swaddled in the fabric of the universe because the book was 90000% responsible for your career. These threads, man, they are HERE for us!! They'll weave together and hold us if we find them (and we let them). And why NOT occasionally pilfer and remix the threads?? We crave patterns. We learn when old ideas are repackaged and shared. Steal like an artist!
1. CHILLS!
2. Whenever seemingly-random threads come together Cat's-Cradle-style, it makes me wonder which seemingly-random threads of my life might make sense 15 years from now (when I'm still blogging on a hologram from space or whatever). Gives me so much hope for life!!
3. STEAL! LIKE! AN! ARTIST!
Hahaha!! My hologram is so there!!!
There is no should.
Love🌻💙
Thank you for your gorgeous reflection. Particularly the part about the desire to rank grief against others. I lost both of my beautiful parents while in my late 30’s/early 40’s and I won’t lie, I’m furious with friends that don’t grasp the depth of these losses/don’t check in/don’t get it. It feels so profoundly unfair but I am just alchemizing these losses earlier than most.
Ugh, Melissa, I'm so so sorry. DANG. I remember being in my 20s, a bit after my father died, sitting at a table with some co-workers who were all in their 50s. One of them said, "You know, we're starting to get to the age where we're realizing that our parents are getting older." Even at the time I thought, "GETTING TO THE AGE?" But another piped up: "If you're realizing that now, you've been very lucky."
Losing parents sucks, any time. I was preoccupied by jealous rage for a few months because I realized my friend's mom was almost 70 and still hadn't lost either of her parents!! I just couldn't get over how unfair it seemed. But you're so right; you are processing something that others are bracing themselves to process, possibly at a time when, in a way, it's harder. Harder and easier. Who knows.
I just read the comments on this post: https://cupofjo.com/2024/03/25/a-parenting-realization-that-really-moved-me/
And the loss of parents being witnesses, or bearers of family information, really hit me. I really, really feel for you, and I'm sending you looootttssss of love.
Thank you so much for this Mari. Last February I lost someone who the world knew as my “aunt” but was truly a third parent that raised me and was one of my biggest support systems in my life. I really resonate with the complicated grief feelings - and especially the frustration of feeling like others around you who haven’t lost someone of that magnitude just don’t get it. I want to scream from the mountains on a near daily basis that she wasn’t *just* an aunt, and feel like I almost need to justify my grief to people who don’t understand the extent or our relationship. It’s such a hard thing to navigate even now that I’m a year into it. Your illustrations really struck a chord. I so appreciate you sharing.
Oh Julia!! I so get that! Last year, whenever I told any acquaintance that my stepdad died, they'd immediately ask about my mom and just basically ignore me. At some point, I just started saying he was my dad, because most didn't know "the truth," and it felt more true to me. It's so hard to explain how large these losses really are!! And we shouldn't have to...but it's interesting how society really does rank them (even though we all know it's complicated!).
I'm so so sorry you lost your precious amazing beautiful aunt. You deserve to grieve an entire ocean over her. I pray you have people in your life who really *get it* and don't need any more explanation than that. Sending love <3
When my late husband Jay died in the our hospital I came home and immediately dropped to the ground in front of the angel canvas he had bought for our home. Supplication. Position of crying and release. May you find peace as you experience this heart rendering loss Mari.
Dearest Sherry, my heart breaks for you. I'm so sorry to hear about Jay. What a horror to come home, to find yourself alone, with just the ground to support you. Supplication is really all that we can possibly muster in those unbelievable and unbearable moments. Sending lots of love on what I'm sure is an ongoing grief journey with lots of crying and release xoxoxo
Thank you Mari. This was 16 years ago! I recall it like yesterday. Fortunately I have done a lot of grief processing (I am a therapist and a bereavement trauma specialist) and wrote a book about it so I am doingwell and experiencing a lot of growth. Of course at times I still acutely miss Jay and our life together while also feeling gratitude for everything I have in my life now. The loss you write about is so very recent and would be so raw I am sure. Sending you lots of love. XOXOXO
16 years or 16 seconds, grief has no timeline, right!!? My friend lost her mom 22 years ago and swears it was yesterday. Or maybe 200 years ago. I'm going to look for your book!!!
You are so kind. It never has a timeline. It never goes away. We move forward yet we do not move on. One quote that has really helped me with grief over time is this one from Mary Oliver: "Someone I once loved gave me a box full of darkness. It took me years to discover that this too was a gift." I ponder this quote every day and what it may mean. The book - "Sweet Sorrow: Finding Enduring Wholeness after Loss and Grief." XOXOXOXOXO to you as you continue to heal from this gut wrenching loss.......
Thank you for this, though I'm sorry you have to bear the pain. We can lose everything BUT the ground under us, and your words have helped me see that.
Oh man, you're so right about that. The ground IS the only thing that won't leave us (scary and comforting)! Interesting how we describe big shocking losses as "the ground falling beneath our feet." It's as though the completely unimaginable becomes real.
Mari, this is so beautiful and resonant. I have found my grief to be incredibly selfish and shameful at times and you so beautifully articulated that experience with grace and loving. Thank you. Also, if you haven’t read it, I highly recommend Martín Prechtel’s “The Smell of Rain on Dust.” It has helped me through the past several years of intense grief. I am so sorry about your friend. 🤍
Oh my gosh Carla, you've made such a good point--I am SUCH a selfish griever!!! And quite self-destructive!! I have often longed to be more graceful and gracious at it, like those beautiful paintings of widows draped beautifully over a mahogany casket. Alas, catch me binge-watching TV with a big scoop of ice cream in my mouth at all times.
Buying that book immediately!!! Thank you so much!
This is beautifully written. Grief is not a one-size-fits-all experience, and it is something humanity lives with a whole. Both are true.
Absolutely. I wonder how much the narratives of grief will change with upcoming generations as families look so different and friendships become more important. I hope it will become a much more inclusive and less-taboo topic!
Mari, you are wise beyond words. Thank you for having the courage to explore and share your journey into the hidden recesses of grief, a subject that often remains cloaked in silence but is nevertheless painfully endured in powerless solitude. In your sharing, you are helping others to see that they too can look down upon the grief they are experiencing in an enabling way.
Oh Margaret, you knew just what to say. Thank you SO so much. Of course I went back and forth, editing and thinking about not publishing this one; the whole thing just felt too dark and weird and hard to post. I really needed to hear that <3 Thank you xoxo
Mari, your meandering journey through life with such stirring and oftentimes delightful awareness, speaks volumes not only in your words, but in your drawings and handwritten outpourings as well.
And yes even grief, which can be profoundly challenging in so many ways, can also be seen as meaningful and beautiful as the pain of loss abates. I say this because grief arises from the loss of something or someone we truly cared for and valued, and there is beauty in this. And while over time we can recover significantly from grief, it does provide us with the much needed time it takes to learn and grow emotionally as we work to find our way forward into new and unfamiliar terrain, a world without the person you came to love and care for.
Thank you Mari, for daring to be you, caring and sharing all the while!
I'll be savoring your words for my next grief-bomb. You are so, so right. Grief is an infant stage where we are discovering a whole new world. Even when we take our first wobbly steps, that's still grief. You are so wise!
Certain feedback just goes straight to my heart without any filter, and yours really got there today. I was feeling insecure about a whole spread of things, but you've helped me to see life as I see it :) Thank you so, so much.
I resonate with this, especially your grief "memories" basket drawing and your list of grief stages. Also Nick Cave's formulation, and yours, that we are born into grief, complete (incomplete) with a sense of lostness, of loss, of yearning.
Accepting the "fact" of yearning as a constant in life has been such a transformative experience for me, and yet I have to remind myself of it every day!! I'm still so attached to getting my way, even when I know that this could all change/disappear at any moment. Phewf, being a human!!!
I really needed to read this today. Wonderful capture of the awfulness of this clunky brand of grief, thank you.
A very beautifully designed message—a canvas where you could paint with the colors of your choice, at the time of your choice, and for the people who are important to you.
This is how grief conversations should be—open, deep but wide, something that embraces new ways to build the dialogue. I loved every part of the story—thank you for doing it.
PS: I wrote an essay for my grandmother who raised me for my first twelve years on the planet: https://medium.com/@vingar/when-a-grandmother-raises-a-tomato-c0fab0b4192c
This post has been sitting in my inbox, waiting for the right moment to read. it is so so so beautiful and so you and so true. So many losses over the years and the one consistent thread i've seen is the destructive power of playing the game of who hurts the most. It's so empty and pointless and hurtful and yet the game everyone tends to immediately jump into. I love thinking about the floor, where we all belong. Can't wait to listen to this nick cave interview. wish i had more time to write but i love you! thank you for sharing!!
Thank you for sharing your writing and your grief. It helps to read about other people's grief. My 10 year old daughter died last year and I suppose this should be a straightforward grief. The grief is mine to take, she is and was my child. Yet, even though this is true, it still feels complicated. She suffered a lot (she had a brain tumour) and there is an element of relief that she is no longer suffering. But this complicates my grief. How can I be sad that she has died, if the alternative, her being alive, meant so much sorrow and pain for her? It is complicated in different ways to the complicated grief that you write about, yet even so, it doesn't feel as simple as I might have once imagined that it would feel, to lose your child. I have been writing about my grief, trying to make sense of it all, though aware it is possible that I can't make sense of it. I expected to be on the floor and in fact, that would feel reassuring, to be on the floor with my grief and tears and sorrow. Yet I am not and somehow, this bothers me. Instead, I am just tired.
This piece is stunning. Thank you 🤍