I need my Brother right now

I'm sad

Exit Stage Right (on time)

You took your leave just in a nick of time, my dear brother. Of course I was sad to see you go, of course I still miss you, of course I wish we still had more time, or a do-over, and of course there are still many things I want to do with you. However things have taken a drastic change for the worst here on this planet. Or perhaps it was you leaving that changed the world... wait, did you break everything when you left?

I know I have said this before, but each time it has a new (not great) meaning. You would not recognize this world today. The seasons are all mixed up (it's getting harder to grow food, or anything for that matter), the planet is warming at an unnatural pace (the sun and heat are punishing - I don't do well in it), ice sheets and glaciers are melting (or have already disappeared), extinctions have accelerated at an alarming rate, environmental pollution is affecting every aspect of health, the rainforests are being levelled for cattle farms (and cattle are a main contributor to methane release), corporate capitalism is now end-stage capitalism (it's death throws are getting more painful to everyone except the rich elite), the permafrost is melting (and releasing god knows what), America is on the verge of a civil war, not to mention we are closer to global nuclear war now then we were in the early 70's. Sea levels are rising fasting that climate models first predicted (there are new factors increasing this along the way that have been hard to predict or account for) and some island nations have already disappeared, and the intensity of our storms have become so severe, the damage and the number of people dying is starting to become normalized. Nationalism, Christofascism, Racism, conflicts and geopolitical tensions are all on the rise, and you can see the Alt-Right has been working for years to obtain higher positions of policy and decision making, military and legal power, and now that they have succeeded they are indeed making the small changes required to change the political landscape. I'm sure I missed something there, sometimes I just don't have the capacity to hold it all at one time.  

So if any time in human history could be called "the end-times" it is undoubtedly right now. Turns out my GenX existential dread was prophecy after all. 

Please stay close as I navigate this! 

Your 20th Deathiversary

Your 20th Deathiversary. Twenty years ago, today, you left us. We still reach for you.

The "Brother Shaped Hole in my Universe" has only grown larger, and it's gravity stronger. I orbit around it, sometimes yelling into it in hope that you can hear me. I like to believe you can.

The BIG 50, forever and ever.

 Dear Baby Brother,

You've been on my mind today, like many days. I find it hard to reflect upon the almost 20 years without you in my life. The unfairness of that still hurts, like paper cut upon paper cut upon paper cut. The older cuts eventually heal, but there are always more. I continue to collect memories of you in every time something great has happened in my life but you weren't here to see them. It has a bitter-sweet taste sometimes, the joy of including you in my internal moment (where I hold space for you to "be there too"), and the very real guilt of being the one who's role is the "survivor." 

I cannot lie, my life has had it's ups and downs, and the ride hasn't always been super fun. But ups and downs are best when shared with family, who gather to celebrate with, or to help me when I cannot help myself. I miss you not being able to be that for me. I miss you everyday. Every time my life changes, every time something big happens in the world. Every time our family celebrates, or mourns. It is little consolation that you left this world, the only one you'd always known, when everything still appeared "OK" whatever that means. Sometimes I envy the timing of your exit strategy, Everything has changed so much in these past two decades the world would be unrecognizable to you, and there's a storm coming. 

Twenty years on, my grief remains palpable, but I accept it now. Once I realized that, for me, there could be no return to "normal," once I accepted that my grief was the price of still loving you, I understood that it would never end. How could it? My brain still looks for you. I have learned a lot about the necessity of grief in these past three years. I am more human today than before.

I don't know by who's grace I deserved to survive through the pain to arrive at that conclusion, but I am grateful.  

For us in the western world, grief has become like a demon we are meant to hide. Do not trouble anyone with it; get right back to work and make sure it doesn't interfere with the means of production. I used to think this was normal, and I worked hard to meet all those expectations. Now I know it's all bullshit. All of it. Capitalism is slavery slapped with a pretty bow so you think "you are making it." Truth is, its become unsustainable. Hence the aforementioned storm.

There's a band these days, called Imagine Dragons, that I really like. In 2013 they released a song called "demons." The poetry haunts me, but I find it so relatable, it provides me with the words to understand my own invisible battles. The lyric's speak to how we hide our pain to protect others from it, yet we yearn for someone to look, to really see us. It encapsulates my GenX existential dread.    

"I wanna hide the truth

I wanna shelter you

But with the beast inside

There's nowhere we can hide

No matter what we breed

We still are made of greed

This is my kingdom come"

Well it seems I am easily distracted today by my thoughts, but I am writing to you because today is the day you would have turned 50 years old.   

Fifty years would have been an impressive milestone to celebrate with you. We could compare health notes (arthritis is a bitch btw). I found a really cool birthday card that I was going to get you, it was very you - Rebel black leather jacket, like the Michael Jackson jackets we used to have. I knew you'd like it. However the price tag was ridiculous, so this post is your card and present. Happy birthday, baby brother, wherever your travels have taken you. 

Don't forget about me.

Moulded by the Darkness

Why do I always feel so much more alone and sad at night? 

So, what the F*ck am I doing?

 Honest question from husband this morning. 

I was, to be fair, still in bed hitting the snooze button every ten minutes for about an hour and a half. I wasn't asleep, I was using the snooze so I would stay aware of the passing of time... something I don't have a great grasp on when I do have all my faculties about me. Lately it's been worse. I mean, of course it's been worse, I am learning time is one of the first things you lose in a nervous breakdown.

I understand this is what happened to me in October, and it stole two months of my life where I was just as helpless as a stupid baby. I couldn't get out of bed. I had stopped doing laundry who knows when (sometime in the summer), and stuff around the house was piling up too. I basically stayed in bed for those two months, and barely remember them. I did emerge at Christmas time and for the hours my darling babies were all here under my roof again I finally felt... calm? Safe? Happy? I'm not sure what exactly, to be fair, I was feeling. My therapist and I talked about how, with everything that has happened to me in my life, and all my losses, that I am terrified I will lose my babies too. So when they are here with me and I know they are safe, my nervous system finally takes a break from hypervigilance and being terrified that they are in danger. A brief reprieve.

Feeling anything or nothing at all has been the primary theme of my nervous breakdown. I've gone from not feeling even hunger, to not being able to breath because my body just will not permit me to release this pain. But it's been three months, and I am not really much better than I was then. Lately my husband wakes me up every morning, makes me tea or coffee, reminds me to brush my teeth. Yes, I am still in that stage. But I woke up this morning knowing I was not going to my appointment today because I knew I was just not going to get out of bed and go out into the real world. I just wanted to cocoon and distract myself. 

This state has been hard for me to exist in. And yes, I have considered the not-existing option. Sometimes I still do, albeit a bit more fleetingly since I have reached a "therapeutic dose" of all these new medicines coursing through my body. Keeping me alive, even against my own will. But mostly the things I think about scare me, and keep me wanting to stay in the relative safety of my bedroom. Some days I have good days, like normal days where you get up, your mood isn't terrible, you get dressed and ready for the day without any cheerleading, and then maybe you have the emotional capacity to actually get a few things done. Schoolwork, housework, therapy. I'm doing a lot of therapy but have to do that even on my bad days. Sometimes the bad days are perfect for therapy because on my good days I find myself doing anything to distract me from my pain. Because that's how much I want to feel something good. But I know it cannot go on like this. I have a lot of work to do before I get better. I want to get better... but it is a daunting, sometimes overwhelming, task looming ahead of me. Why is it still so hard? Why isn't this easier? Why am I still having more bad days than good?

I used to fantasize about a "mid-life crisis." Some people seem to have so much fun with theirs... sports cars, safari's, sky diving, etc. When you don't know how something feels, you tend to romanticize it. Or, at least, I do. I'm sorry I coveted these experiences with some amount of jealousy, because, well, this hasn't been fun. I don't think this is exactly what one experiences with a mid-life crisis, as having a nervous breakdown is like...  running out of batteries, being completely broken, needing to reboot.

So... what the fuck AM I doing? 

Well first, I'm trying. Sometimes that means just getting through each day. I search my days for meaning and then I hang on to whatever meaning I find.

Second, I am doing the work. I started a grief in person support group where they teach you how to grieve and release that grief. This has, for many reasons, been a huge challenge for me. Mostly I have tried in my life to not show vulnerability, and as such never learned how to properly grieve. I have therapy appointments every two weeks until the end of March. I am blogging, and will try to do more of that because both my therapist and my grief group counsellors say that journaling is an important part of active recovery.

Third, I am trying to learn from other people. I am part of a sibling loss group on facebook, and it's been helpful to read that people feel the same things I do, which is a relief because this journey of grief is already so isolating as it is. Its also good for me to be able to share my experiences as well with a group of people who understand what I am feeling. What a sad club that is. However, I digress.

Fourth I am trying to do my school work. This has been particularly difficult for me as my brain fog, memory issues, and lack of executive functioning makes it quite hard to retain information. But I am trying. 

Fifth... I have a list of things to do. OK, maybe I have several lists - a larger to-do list for getting my life back together (whatever that means), a short term list (journaling, walking the neighbors dog, painting my bedroom)... and an everyday list of things I need to do. Everyday. 

1. Wake up at 8am
2. Brush/floss teeth
3. Wear clean underwear (implies doing some laundry as well)
4. Brush hair
5. Bathe/shower
6. Take medicine
7. Eat something healthy
8. Go outside (I am failing at this more than I would like)
9. Wash hair as needed

Also, as I get stronger and more able I have things I would like to be doing again. Going to the gym. Riding my bike. Reading for fun. Maybe being more social and making some new friends in my co-op. Maybe get a dog. Figuring out what my work life needs to be like. But these are all hopeful, next level, return to life, things for me. They seem a little out of reach for me at this moment in time. 

So although I appear to be a sad, human pile of dirty laundry most of the time, these are the things I am currently doing. I don't understand how I did everything I did before this happened. Family, work, volunteering, housework, friends, school, pets, outdoors, etc. It all seems impossible to me now.

Today I will be working on my presentation of Dead Vikki for my grief group. I present it on this Thursday. We are encouraged to only include one lost one (as we have 10 minutes each), so I chose Vikki as her death was my most recent and lead me closer to this breakdown, but really I feel the loss of two of my siblings, and my extreme fear that I will lose Kate as well, is really at the heart of all of this. 

Sibling loss is a hard one.   

Permitted Grief - Part One

Today is a difficult day for me, it's the the first anniversary of the day that I was frantically trying to get to England, willing the miles to pass faster while I pleaded with whomever you plead with in these situations, all while desperately hoping that everything was in fact just a mistake and Vikki would actually be ok. It's easier to occupy your mind with such fantasies than it is to analyze the shock you've just had, or to let the pain get too big. We're British you know, stiff upper lip and all, brave face in public, etc. I wonder how many of us are actually emotionally damaged because of that one particular cultural directive. I know I am, but that is a another post all in itself. For this post I want to talk about how grief is regarded in our Canadian society. Mostly because I am struggling with so much grief of varying levels of pain, and I'm not sure where to start untangling everything.

I'm somewhat embarrassed about this state that I found myself in. I KNOW I am not supposed to feel shame for having a mental health crisis. I know that we SAY that mental health is important. I'm just worried that isn't really the truth. What will they think of me at work? When I go back, will I still be considered capable? Will this affect future promotions or opportunities? Will they see ME?

I asked my therapist what he would call my "state." He said he would call it a Major PTSD Depressive episode with Adjustment Disorder due to grief" but then he said "You are not your grief. I've known you for a long time, and I see YOU."

I don't know how many people actually see me. 

I can be honest with people, but I find that they don't actually want the truth. They want me to say "I'm fine," or "living the dream." My children know parts of my childhood were hard, but I wouldn't share the details with them. My husband knows some of the more intricate details, but I am loathe to burden him or add to his struggles with the demons inside of me. My best friend Dawn witnessed some of my childhood abuse, but she's been distant lately, and we are far apart. I know I can say anything to my therapist. I know these people are people who do see me. I try to craft whatever façade is needed for the other people I am interacting with. One of my first signs that I was going downhill should have been when I stopped doing this. I started saying things like "I'm not doing well," or "I feel sad." But these types of conversations make people feel uncomfortable and, in turn, their reactions increased my isolation. And I started noticing people would comment that I was always being so negative, rather than sit with me and ask me if they could help. Not everyone, mind you, I have some very supportive friends who love me despite of me being me. But this still leaves me trying to discern what amount of grief and grieving time is proper, and what types of grief are permitted. The answer should be all grief is valid, but we all know that's not the truth. 

People respond differently to the types of loss they experience, each loss is unique. But the way we respond to them is based on an unwritten societal hierarchy that defines how much someone should be upset and grieve, and for how long. It's stupid. I don't like using that word, but come on, why do we make our own lives harder in the name of society? Many cultures honour death and grief much better than we do. In Vietnam each death is mourned for a year, and there are certain rituals and points along the way where you still connect with your loved ones and your memories. Here, it feels like once a funeral is done, you should be over it. Back to work, smile, be productive and don't be a downer. Is it any wonder we bury our emotions until they are to large to contain? And that when it bursts, we break apart?

I guess it gives my therapist a job to do. Look at me, supporting my local businesses!

So one of my losses that still affect me quite a bit is when my dog died. Yes, I said my dog. Most people do not recognize grief from pet loss, so it's a very isolating journey. I got Luna as a puppy in BC the day after your funeral. She changed my life. I don't have a PTSD dog, but she was always there when I needed her. She lived a long life, longer than what is normal for her breed. Luna blessed us for 15 years - her entire lifetime. My kids grew up with her. I am pretty sure she hung on so long because I was going through my Mom's drawn out death, and I needed her. I DID need her. That dog lived for so long she was blind and deaf by the end. We'd even scheduled an in home vet appointment so she could die with us in her home, but she rallied and we cancelled it. We did heap lots of attention and treats on her. But when her death came it was not a good death. It was very traumatizing for me. Something had happened in her brain, and she had seizures all the way to the emergency vet at 2am. It's not easy to hang on to a medium size dog having seizures, but I was not going to abandon her on this last final car ride, so I sat in the rear seat with her so she'd have room to move as needed. By the time we got to the vet, the pressure in her head was so much her eyes were bulging out of her head. I couldn't carry her into the vet because of the seizures, they had to bring a contraption to take her in on. We went straight to the back into a surgery room, but I KNEW this was the end. The vet dallied with his consult of my precious Luna, and my heart was breaking with each passing second. I told him to put her down, because I knew I'd already lost her and I couldn't bear to see her in anymore pain. He killed her right there, in my arms, on that operating table. 

She took part of me with her, all those times that she comforted me when it was just her and I. Our adventures together. The tears she would lick away. It's the same parts of me that everyone takes with them upon death - the memories of who I was in life with just that person, and the stories they had of me. It's hard to lose that, I am sure there is a grief term for that loss, but you are suddenly forever different. 

So my dog died. She was 15 years old, an age where no one has any sympathy for you, or they have a limited sympathy that is not really permitted to be longer than just that conversation. 

Because she was "just a dog" and I could "get another one."

But she wasn't just a dog. She was MY dog, and she came into my life at exactly the time I needed her to. She was born a street dog in Thailand, a descendant of the great Thai Ridgeback, and was in a live animal food market. To be food. A Canadian tourist saw them there and bought the whole litter. An animal rights organization in Thailand helped her get all the dogs to BC, where she took them to the SPCA for adoption. It was, by happenstance, the SPCA my best friend worked at, and she phoned me and told me she'd found the dog I needed. And she was right.

Luna died 5 years ago now. I didn't get a new dog. I didn't want any dog but Luna. Maybe the term is don't, because whenever I think of bringing a dog home my heart skips a beat and happily says "YES, lets bring Luna home!!!!"   

I still grieve the loss of my dog. But that's not actually a "permitted grief." I can't say to someone I am sad because my dog died ... 5 years ago. I have registered in a grief therapy program that starts in January, and on the website it says, specifically, pet loss is not a loss that can qualify you for the program. 

BUT IT'S STILL GRIEF. Honestly my grief journey with Luna's passing has been as real to me as any other loss I've had. So on the hierarchy of permitted grief, pets are at the bottom, only above the loss of a job, or relationship. So that's why I started Part One of Permitted Grief with the story of Luna.

                                                                       

All You Need Is Love

My Therapist gave me some homework to do before our next session. He said to read up on Attachment Injuries so I'd have the words to talk about what I need to talk about. 

So, what is childhood attachment injury?

Google tells me this: "Attachment trauma is a disruption in the important process of bonding between a baby or child and his or her primary caregiver. That trauma may be overt abuse or neglect, or it may be less obvious—lack of affection or response from the caregiver."

Ah, I see. 

You know, I would never have wished Mom's abuse to be directed at you; I probably actually consoled myself at points that if it was me, it wasn't you. But I don't understand why our childhoods were so different despite living in the same family and house. Mom loved you so much, and you loved her back. Mom would do, and did do, everything you ever asked for. I might still be a bit bitter of how she bought you a brand new car after I had worked to buy my first second hand car. But that's a post for another day. 

Your Mother was not the Mother I knew. Everyone loved your Mother. 

She was a different person to me; I never knew the Mom that you had. But I really wanted to. 

Despite opportunities to reconcile at times through my adult life, she took her reasons to the grave. After she died, and I was going through her stuff to clean up her apartment, letters from you to her, cards that people sent her... I finally realized that it was just me. There was no mental health diagnosis for me to understand or find solace in. My Mother just didn't love me. ME. She never even really liked me. 

I found this picture of Dad and I the other day.

I wanted a childhood full of this. I wanted to be touched and held in a loving manner by my Mother.

This is not something my Mother did with me. I have little to no memory of her showing me any genuine kindness (except for the time when I was small and upset I remember being in her lap while she gently stroked my ear to calm me down). I think I remember it so well because I wanted it so bad. There are no pictures of my mother holding me, whilst in contrast, there are many pictures of you and her, and she is always beaming in those photos. She was fiercely protective and proud of you. Your Mother was the Mother I wish I'd had.

She was always angry at me, disappointed, complaining about me, punishing me, or poisoning me. Sometimes she was indifferent to me and other times she'd lock me in the basement or my closet. She always said she wanted to put a lock on the outside of my bedroom door, but Dad wouldn't let her. 

There were times when her rage towards me was so... intense.

I remember a story Dad used to tell, he thought it was a funny anecdote. He said that one day he and the neighbour heard this little voice saying "Help me, I'm trapped. I'm being held prisoner." So they looked everywhere and finally my Dad found me in my room hanging from the window sill so I could reach the open screen. He thought it was a funny story to tell at Christmas times. But I was a baby still, maybe three or four years old. It wasn't a joke.

So now I have learned a new term. It's called Trauma Bonding.

I don't know how to reconcile any of that. I guess I am about to learn a new skill I wish I never had to need. 

I Could Skate Away

Oh I wish I had a river so long

I would teach my feet to fly

Oh I wish I had a river
That I could skate away on

Apparently I never learned how to grieve in the manner that other humans somehow instinctively know how to.

My therapist said it's like I have a river of grief inside of me that I have frozen solid so I don't have to feel it. And as we all know, that river is pretty full. There have been times when that river has overrun it's banks and threatened to drown me. It's what I do, respond to a loss and then pack it away and get back to the business of living, as I believed was expected. I didn't know that this would happen. I didn't know that one day, a future me would be brought to her knees by an enormity of grief and trauma that is still running rampant and unchecked through my nervous system. 

I am in the midst of the worst mental health crisis I've ever had. For someone with an ACE score of 7, with PTSD, who exists on the spectrum, and who has - in the past - been hospitalized while suicidal, that is saying something. 

I'll spare you the gory details, but sometimes I forget what I am saying - in mid sentence. I have two months of laundry I still can't get to, and I am still waking up screaming - despite the new drugs my Doctor has put me on. I can't remember those dreams - all I get when I try to recall them is a black wall. My brain doesn't want me to see them. It's protecting me. 

Honestly I am terrified. 

What could be this horrific that my brain thinks it is best if I don't remember it? It lets me remember some pretty alarming trauma, often in vivid detail. So what can it be?

My therapist says I have to start letting the river thaw. I told him how much I was scared of that pain, and he reminded me that it always hurts to thaw out, but after the pain you feel better again. I appreciate this analogy, it works for me in understanding what I have to do to get better.

I'm terrified of how big the pain inside me is. I have a high tolerance for physical pain, and I've had my fair share of that. But this pain is so enormous. Sometimes it leaks out and even just that little bit feels so overwhelming. I don't know if I can survive it. 

I might die from this. Just skate away...

Death comes for everyone, doesn't it? 

But maybe, just maybe, if I am strong enough, this journey of grief will become a heroic tale of healing and recovery. 

The Grief is Unrelenting

I made a mistake.

I tried to just label my griefs as finished instead of processing them. I jumped back into work. I focused on helping other people. 

Pretty soon I was just going through the steps, one foot in the front of the other, even if my feet seemed made of lead. 

I don't know if I can fully blame myself. I did want to be a good employee and I was grateful for the time my employer had given me to grieve and I felt like I needed to repay that by "getting over it" and appearing strong and dependable. I wanted to appear "self reliant," and resilient. I thought I could do it on my own. Because, increasingly, you guys keep leaving me on my own...

I forgot that there is no "getting over it."

Vikki's death hurt so much. It still hurts and I am afraid of what will happen if I let it all out too quickly. I wish she had told me that she was dying. I wouldn't have put off my plans to see her. I would have gone earlier. I would have held her hand as she left and kissed her gently. 

I deserved that. But we all know how life isn't fair. 

So it finally happened that I pushed too far into burnout and ignored some signs I shouldn't have, and I stopped taking care of myself and I started thinking about driving my car into trees on the way to work. I became a human puddle. One day I felt so afraid of leaving the house and I called the doctor and finally said something. 

I'm also so very worried about Kate. She is also not doing well either and has access to far less supports than I do. I am afraid that she will die. I am afraid she won't survive such a hard loss of losing her twin. It is both anticipatory grief and extreme worry for her wellness. She's in pain too. Every time the phone rings I worry. If you get a chance to look in on her please do.

I hope you don't mind me writing in our blog here about all the many losses I have had in the past 5 years. I know this blog was always intended just for you and I, but I also never believed I would be left behind by so many. Too many. Sorry but I will be dragging you along in this grief journey and my therapist says that journaling is a good place to start, and it did help me with you, so here we are. 

The Years Start Coming...

 ... and they don't stop coming.

Time is relentless. 

Time is aggressive and unforgiving. 

But it is also a beautiful gift. 

A lot has happened since I last wrote to you. It took me a while to be ok to be sharing the news I have to share.   

Vikki died just before Christmas. I tried to get there to say goodbye, but it was not meant to be.

She left much in the same way you did. No warning. No way to be prepared. No way to shelter my heart before. Full frontal assault. More sibling loss grief.

It turns out that Vikki knew that she was ill but decided not to share that info, which is fine, I can't be mad at her for just trying to live her life in the way she needed too. But I struggle to reconcile the plans we had and the future that we looked forward to. Just like I did with you, I thought that we had many years yet to share together. I made the mistake again of trusting time. It's hard not too. 

I know you have dream walked with Kate, it's lovely to know that you are still visiting when you can.

Auntie Vi also died, she passed last summer peacefully. It wasn't unexpected of course, given that she had reached the ripe old age of 96... but I was not prepared for it. My heart refused to consider it when I tried to broach the subject, so I just had to face it as it happened. Which was hard. For me, Auntie Vi was always my favourite Auntie, but for many years much more of a mother to me than our own mother was. But I found saying good bye to her was a bit like losing everyone - Nana and Poppy, Dad, Uncle Ron. She had kind of kept all of them alive for me, held all those memories and stories and while I am grateful for her life and my time in it, I was very sad to see her go.

Trying to distract myself

 I had to drive through Edson today and I couldn't stop thinking about the guy who killed you. Lots of thoughts that are not fit to be cemented into being by giving them words. I did however look him up on facebook. And I messaged him. I guess we will see where that goes.  

The stories we don't tell

The photo

Within my British family many stories were told, but many more were absent. It was considered a point of pride to “suffer in silence.”

Stories that were shared were often funny, recalling some antics of a relative, or meaningful as to deliver a poignant lesson. The real stories, the ones steeped in trauma, lessons from the world wars for example, were withheld. While some of these stories were alluded to, the lessons my family felt important to pass down (i.e. never to trust Germany), were taught seemingly without context.

You could feel some of these stories, even though they were hidden, as if they were a family member in the shadows waiting to be seen. But they were never spoken of.

Before deciding to settle in Canada, my father served as a fireman for many years in the London Fire Brigade. Looking back now I can see my father suffered with the demons of trauma, although he only ever shared stories that were humourous (like pushing a cat out of a tree with a hose), or successful (like the time he had given a German shepherd mouth to mouth and revived him). He protected us from his pain.

Turns out though, the seemingly greatest story was the one that remained untold.

It wasn’t until years after my father passed away in 2004 that I became aware of the photo. My mother said it must be somewhere in his belongings and expressed that it was important that we find it. She did not disclose the story, or reveal any meaning, behind the photo, instead saying that it had won an award and pictured my father rescuing a small child from a fire.

Whatever my mother knew of the story she took to her grave.

It took a while to find the photo. When we did it was well glued into one of my father’s many scrapbooks. Unable to dislodge it from its page, I took a picture of it and uploaded it to instagram, hashtagging it #londonfirebrigade. Almost immediately someone from the Brigade commented on the picture, identifying my father, his unit, the date of the incident and the location. It seemed like a tiny miracle to have this information, a blossoming half story we’d likely never realize the fullness of. I related this discovery to my mother, who managed to look pleasantly surprised by my “new” information. The picture itself became well appreciated among family and friends, reproduced and admired, but it still guarded it’s secrets.

When my mother passed last year I faced the enormous task of going through two lifetimes of artifacts within a very short time. It was during this furious sorting that I found the newspaper article and my father's typed report of that day.

My father's report was a harrowing tale, he—now an officer—had arrived on the scene without the breathing equipment which it was policy to don when entering burning structures. However, when he heard the mother cry that her two babies were still in the house, my father’s instinct overtook him and he and a colleague rushed into the home. Desperately searching, on hands and knees, feeling along the walls to find doors because the smoke was so thick they could not see.

They did eventually find both of the children, curled up together under a blanket in a bedroom, no doubt trying to hide from the fire. Each grabbed a child and, as my father’s recount states, he raced to where he recalled the ambulance had been when he had arrived on scene. Sadly all efforts were in vain; the boy died 30 minutes later. My father’s report was professional, but it had an unmistakable undertone of sorrow and deep regret.

The news clipping my father had kept revealed more of the story. The little boy my father had carried out, so fervently willing him to live, was named Christopher.

This could seem like a trivial piece of information except that my brother, born twelve years later, had been named Christopher, and I had long wondered where the name had come from as it is not a traditional family name.

As we slowly weave this story back into our family narrative, reclaiming it as much as possible, we can never understand why it was kept secret as there is no one left who knows. The meaning we attribute to it will be our best interpretation of the story of courage, life, and hope, arising from the shared human experience of trauma.

* Submitted on 26 May 2020 as a personal essay for my ENGL 308 class and also posted here because of it's connection to Chris.

Toast to the ones that we lost on the way

"There's a time that I remember, when I did not know no pain

When I believed in forever, and everything would stay the same

Now my heart feel like December when somebody say your name

'Cause I can't reach out to call you, but I know I will one day, yeah

Everybody hurts sometimes

Everybody hurts someday, aye aye

But everything gon' be alright

Go and raise a glass and say, aye

Here's to the ones that we got

Cheers to the wish you were here, but you're not

'Cause the drinks bring back all the memories

Of everything we've been through

Toast to the ones here today

Toast to the ones that we lost on the way

'Cause the drinks bring back all the memories

And the memories bring back, memories bring back you"

This song kills me every time. This has been a year where you have been close, for lots of reasons, but really this is just life now, the new normal when you live your life with grief. Cheers to the "wish you were here but you're not." 

What punishments of God are not gifts?

It's Thanksgiving weekend and when I think of things I am grateful for I think of the time we had together as brother and sister. I didn't realize, as most of us don't, that our time together would be so much shorter than expected, that it was a gift soon to be taken back. I had no idea that would hurt so much. Not just to lose you, but to simply be without you, to have to exist in a world where you are no longer.

When Tolkien wrote "What punishments of God are not gifts" I think he was exploring the meaning of suffering in human existence, no doubt well informed by the trauma he experienced in World War I and the early loss of his parents. For Tolkien, it seems pain and suffering is tantamount to being human, and something that is inescapable as part of that condition, and as such must be expected alongside all of the other things that comes with being human. We love, therefore we hurt. It isn't a choice, for we must love, must seek out attachments, must find connections, because that is what it means to be human - ergo alive. But the loss of that love, or the absence of that gift, causes us pain and sadness. Forever, it seems. The gift of that love and those experiences of it are indeed, great gifts, The loss of love does, at first, feel like punishment. Loss really is the continuation of that gift of love, and we wouldn't opt to remove the pain, by simply never having had that gift. The punishment, it seems, is the price we pay for being human, yet it is still the  greatest gift we have been given.

Last night you came to me in a dream. You arrived out of the blue with a wife and two children and you hugged me tight and said that you were sorry to show up unannounced but that you'd really like to join us for Thanksgiving. It felt pretty real, that hug. I still feel it. I've felt it all day long. It hurts a bit too, because it's a common trope that my mind plays with that you were just away somewhere, and that one day you will show up again and it will all have been a mistake.

I am thankful for this dream. I am thankful for this visit, this hug, that I can still feel, even though it hurts. I am grateful that you remain with me, that I remember you, that I can still see you in my dreams. I am thankful for you.

Happy Thanksgiving little brother. You are, of course, always welcome. 
 

We Were Having Fun

Fifteen Years Came and Went...

“The future came and went in the mildly discouraging
way that futures do.”

 
- Neil Gaiman (Good Omens)

... And Many More

Today is your birthday, your most favourite time of the year. If you were still here with us, you'd be celebrating your 45th birthday, which is a decent milestone. We'd probably laugh and call you old, teasing you for whatever new ache you had. We'd sing the happy birthday song and end with the words "and many more..."

Sometimes we say words without realizing how much of a quiet prayer they are. Or we say them not expecting that we need to consider them such a hopeful wish.

Because sometimes "many more" becomes "no more."

And no more is the saddest birthday of all.

A Final Resting Place

This nautical buoy sits at the entrance to Departure Bay, along the route BC Ferries travel to get in and out of the Nanaimo Harbour.

You might recognize it from your youthful antics that may or may not have involved you and Geoff being chastised by the Coast Guard for hanging off of it as the ferry passed, sending some enormous waves your way. This is where Geoff wanted to scatter you and it turned out to be the perfect place.     

Letting you go