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MourningWho originated that most exquisite of inquisitions, the condolence system? |
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Thursday, October 15, 1998
One year ago: Advice
I feel rather tired tonight, so much so that I came away right after my lindy hop lesson, and didn't stay for the dance. Shocking! But my leg was a bit sore, and if I'm going to the Friday night practice tomorrow, I thought it better to rest it tonight. Class was fun! Even though I skipped it last week to go to the movies with Jack, I was able to catch up, probably because I'm a follow. It's more difficult for the leads to learn to dance a new move, and to lead it at the same time. I'm thinking seriously that I'll learn the lead's part in the next session, which starts in a few weeks.
My tooth is only making me slightly uncomfortable from time to time. My mother used to be very stoic about physical pain, but I don't think I am. I'd say if I were in agony, really I would! So I'm taking some ibuprofen for it, and keeping some extra pills with me for reassurance, like a security blanket.
I'm having a good time at work! The efforts that went into this automation tool I'm using are really paying off. An outside team approached us with a wish to add some samples to my area. In the last go-round, we would have had to tell them that it was too late to add them before we ship! But I went and talked to the guy who would be providing the samples to us, and realized that it was really doable! He had a good understanding of our message and the format the samples should be in. I just felt all in-control and efficient!
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I'm getting caught up with Vicki Jean's Chez XX. My few days of non-connectivity at home coincided with her return to posting after being at home for her father's final illness and death. This is hard for me to read, since it really does take me back to my parents' final days. They died within two weeks of each other, in 1988. We are getting close to the ten-year anniversary of that time. In fact, I'd put off reading the full story of her father's death when I saw from the entry titles what had happened. Tonight I had the time and strength to read it.
It's such an odd, out-of-flow, time, the actual vigil at the bedside of someone dying. And how much you grieve while they are dying, when it's a long illness. It's like you grieve ahead of time! So many little losses as the dying person gets weaker and sicker.
The old customs of mourning had a lot of good things about them. The wearing of black clothes was a marker that meant that the mourning person wasn't held to normal standards of behavior. The mourner might cry or laugh inappropriately, or act oddly in other ways, and that was okay!
I really like Vicki's journal. I know it was about a year ago that Luke recommended her to me, because I remember how powerful her writing was about the death of her dog.
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My weekend plans aren't fully formed yet, which makes me slightly uncomfortable. A good spiritual exercise: be in the moment, go with the flow. I know that I have to fix food for the homeless men at my parish overflow shelter on Saturday, plus there is a Cacophony event I want to attend.
Columbine of Alewife Bayou thinks I read her by fits and starts. Actually, I'm a daily reader, from work. Even though I already was a reader of Diane and Kymm and Al, I like the smallness (and quick server responsiveness!) of the Thinking Aloud ring, which is not a webring.org ring. It's a script of Columbine's own making, I think. So a trip around the ring is now a part of my morning ritual at work, like checking the alt.recovery.clutter and rec.arts.dance newsgroups.
But I still miss the "Stay Tuned" writing about advertising, which is how I first found Columbine, and which was part of my Monday morning ritual.
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