Battling the Relentless Grief Monster

“Pull over and call me back. Can you do that?” These are the words that blow apart my brilliant, calm Wednesday afternoon. It is June 16, 2021 and I am driving home from a relaxing pedicure, a necessity given the fact that I am driving to Utah that weekend for a last-minute family wedding. When I glance down and see it is my big sister calling, I assume some last-minute wedding change-of-plans. “Hi! I’m driving!” I sing-song as I hit “speaker” and maneuver into a left-turn lane on Cornell. What happens next is a full 90 seconds of sheer panic as I extricate myself from the turn lane and wildly look for a side street — any side street — while maniacally chanting Oh no Oh no Oh no Oh no Oh no Oh no. I have heard many many tones in my sister’s voice in my life. I have never heard this one before. I take a hard right onto the first open side street, swing into an open curb space and with shaking hands I dial my sister back.

Her voice is completely wrecked as I bow my head and take in the unspeakable news that my big brother Jed has slipped while hiking in the Wasatch Mountains and has fallen to his death. My world goes still. Wait….what??? My blissed-out brain scrambles to make some sense of the words Jan is saying. “Jed is dead?” I hear my far-off tinny voice reverberate through the interior of the car like some cruel bizarre mocking Dr. Seuss joke. No no no no no no no no no no. Oh the agony in my sister’s voice. Oh the horror of feeling grief and pain and loss slice through my soul while hearing the exact same physiological terror happening to a soul I love so much. My dark brain had a full 90 seconds to spin the most horrendous thing imaginable. Even I didn’t come up with my brother falling off a mountain. My brother — the expert hiker. My brother — the sickeningly good, kind, decent father of 3 and grandfather of 7. My brother, who does nothing but propel goodness into the world. Not Jed. Not Jed. This inconceivable news propels me out of my car and onto the curb where I cradle my head and sob into my hands. The fucking shocking IMPOSSIBILITY of it all. He is our anchor — our patriarch. Not Jed. No, not him. The expert hiker who hikes literally all the time. The guy who scales the Grand Canyon every year with ease. Really, Death? THAT guy? Seriously? We had just made DINNER PLANS for the first week in July. I had told him I couldn’t wait to see him and his wife. We had finalized pizza. I frantically pull out my phone and search for the text. There it is. “Sounds good”. So that is IT? That’s the last text from my brother? He’s just GONE? That’s what’s happening here, Death? Seriously?

Through my wet, sticky hands my impossibly pink toes glitter up at me from the backdrop of those too-bright yellow fake pedicure sandals and the staggering blasphemy of that shock of color fills me with rage and sadness. I somehow remember to breathe in and out. I’m not sure how long I sit there, in the gutter. When I slowly pick myself up to make my way back to my car, I glance up at the street sign at which I had taken a hard, impressive right. Joy Ave. I turned right onto Joy Ave. Joy. Fucking. Avenue. The unimaginable irony of that goddamn street sign folds me in half across the steering wheel while my all-consuming hatred of the universe in that moment churns through my guts. I somehow remember to breathe in and out enough to start the car and make my way home.

I am overwhelmed with thoughts of his family, thoughts of my family. What will we do without him? But mostly I am slammed with the all-consuming thought of how much I DON’T WANT TO DO THIS. The UNFAIRNESS of it all. My life has been FLYING along. I have an incredible new job with the company of my dreams and I have been spending my days doing interesting work and meeting new amazing people. Don’t you understand, Grief? I DON’T HAVE TIME FOR THIS. I am tired of battling you, Grief. I am tired of bowing my head in the face of unspeakable pain and loss, only to have to raise it again and stare into your cold dead terrifying eyes.

I am no stranger to how you work, Grief, and I do not want to battle you today. I do not have time for the potpourri of every available emotion on the spectrum only to have the added delight of not being able to control a goddamn one of them. I know how this works. And I don’t want any part of it. Not today.

I know enough now to know how this works, Grief. You are an uncaring, soulless, indifferent beast. You are also very clever. You are also very patient. I know that whatever is going on in my world that I haven’t really processed yet, you will jump on that shit like Jackie Joyner in ’88. If I don’t have my whole “hey my carefully constructed world damn shy of close relationships is actually pretty spectacular” thing locked in, you will break me in half. That’s how you roll. You are as pervasive and as destructive as groundwater, seeping into every available organism, waiting for the erosion that will ensure my utter collapse. I’ve taken you on before, Grief, when I was younger and less experienced in the ways of life and loss — remember? I’ve stared at you, Grief, from the bottom of a shot glass. I’ve tried to drown you in expensive vodka, only to be surprised and disappointed to find you’re an accomplished swimmer.

I don’t want to do any of this. I don’t want to feel the impossibility of what I’m feeling. But I know now that FEELING is the only way through. I don’t want to stay up all night googling “hiker falls to death in Utah” so the internet will tell me how my brother died. I don’t want to spend too many minutes calculating exactly how far 400 feet is. But I do. I sob and type and look for answers. I don’t want to. But I do. I think of every time I’ve had dinner at the Portland City Grill on the 45th floor. I think about how high that is. I think about how far he fell. I cry some more. I wipe my nose and eyes on the back of my wrist. I think about his last few seconds. I think about what he must have thought and felt. I cry onto my keyboard. I don’t want to. But I do.

I don’t want to do any of this. I don’t want to face “reality”. I don’t want to drive numbly to a strange church and hug people from my hometown. I don’t want to run headfirst into everyone else’s thoughts and beliefs about life and death. I don’t want to hear things like it was “his time” and his “work is done” and he’s “with my parents now”. These useless platitudes pound in my temples and cause my teeth to grind. But I know we all say what we have to say to cope. I have my own thoughts and beliefs about life after death. However, they are much less popular, so I keep them to myself. I believe in love after death. Lots and lots of love.

What I know now, Grief, is that this battle is not to be denied you rapacious, soulless, insatiable behemoth. You will claim your time and space. Much like a trapped air bubble seeking oxygen — you will find your way out. You are a heat seeking missile searching for unresolved emotions. I will lose this battle. And I hate that. I hate knowing I’ve already lost. Because I must do the thing I don’t want to do now — I must FEEL. I must feel and stumble my way forward. And I hate your fucking guts for that, Grief. I hate that you will win. I hate that even with that knowledge, I will still strap on whatever feeble weapon I think I have in that moment and I will still try and take you on. Because what other choice do I have? The inescapable battle must be fought. And we’ve done this before. Some days I will leap into battle and emerge victorious like Skywalker coming out of Jabba’s impossible pit. Other days I will crumble like Oberyn Martell at the sheer impossibility of the beast and I will lay on the battlefield blankly staring at…..nothing. Some days I will feel so prepared and I will swagger into battle, leaping and wrestling you to the ground, only to stagger under the sheer weight of your being, your impossibly slick torso dancing away, laughing, while I lay bone-tired on the ground.

I don’t want to deal with you. But I will. I know what this looks like. I will shout at the Starbucks barista for the shocking lack of cream in my americano. I will shuffle from room to room in a fog, numbly forgetting what I was looking for in the first place. I will pound my fists on my keyboard. I will yell at Powerpoint. I will take you on. Because I know this battle is the price of love, as Pinterest-y as that bullshit sounds. Yes, grief is the price of love. And I am prepared to pay this price.

I think about my continued amazement at what we accept as the human condition. We sign up for this kind of epic battle. All the time. I think briefly about the three compact fur-sized bundles of future unimaginable pain and grief walking around my own home at this very instant. I think of my life without their calm purring influence. I think about that long overly-adorable fur mitten that drapes across my neck, kneading its surface, every morning. One morning that paw will be gone. And in its place will be more battles. More unexpected combat. More exhaustion. More fucking growth. We blithely say that death is a part of life. But holy fuck — the pain.

So why — why on earth do we do this? Why do we willingly warrior-up for this debilitating fight? Why on earth do we attach ourselves, why do we fall madly in love with people and their zest for life and love? Because, goddamnit, that too is part of the human condition. And when someone who touches our hearts and souls like my brother did suddenly exits without warning — it leaves a gaping hole in quite literally every story I’ve told myself about life and death. How to move on now when I’m so very tired? What useless weapon should I scrap together to numbly stumble into battle this time? What weapon not only conquers all but will even give me a slim fighting chance?

The answer comes to me while sitting in a Mormon church (my mother would have loved that line). It comes, quite fittingly, through the wisdom of my big brother. My brother was so many things: generous, loving, patient, caring, determined and full of life and love of adventure. He was also very organized and left detailed instructions on what was to take place at his funeral luncheon. A lifetime passion for classic rock and roll dictates what we all have to do next: listen to his favorite songs. As I sit in that all-too-bright church gymnasium with the still-noticeable basketball hoops, looking at the covered round tables (making it indistinguishable from a Mormon wedding reception but whatever), I listen to my amazingly strong sister-in-law tee up the songs that inspired my brother. I wait with muted reverence for the first strain of sound. When that first decidedly very well-known chord strikes through the silence in that cultural hall, it takes a few seconds to realize just exactly what in the hell is happening. Wait. Could it be? Yes. It is. I am sitting in a Mormon church listening to the definitive epic sounds of Tom Sawyer by Rush. The only thing I feel in that moment is incredible expanse. My mouth grows into a wide grin and my heart explodes in my chest. What a truly awesome moment. It is then that I have my answer. Joy. I forgot about Joy. Joy is why we do all of this. That’s the weapon I will choose. I will choose Joy. The battle is inescapable, but the weapon of choice is mine. I took a hard right on the street that contained the answer. The answer is Joy. My weapon will be Joy.

And so, again, I raise my weary head and hand to your greedy ungodly force, Grief. I will turn my head to the colossal unfairness and sheer impossibility of death coming so early for my brother. I will somehow move forward and grow around this pain and loss and it will morph into….something else. I don’t know yet. All I know is I believe in love after death. I believe in Joy after death. I believe in my brother’s unparalleled adventurous joyous spirit. I know thinking of him will be a daily pastime for the rest of my life. I will feel Joy in his honor. I will conquer as-yet unknown battles with Neal Peart’s oh-so-fitting words as my sword and shield:

The world is…the world is…

Love and Life are deep,

Maybe as His skies are wide.

Love you to the sky and back, bro. I will battle on, in your honor.