I was carrying around in my head the death of another friend last week. On the radio came a reference to Stop the Steal from a couple years ago. I thought to myself, “How about a Stop the Sadness movement? That’s what I need.”
But sometimes it comes in waves. It’s as if you are standing to your knees in the ocean, 10-foot waves crashing over you, one after the other, barely giving you time to brace yourself before the next.
Jan Zilka was a friend a long time. I tried to remember when I met her and that is lost in a small-town past. In a place like Sleepy Eye, you’ve known everybody forever. Jan was a California kid; that might explain her spunky and bright personality.
We knew her battle with cancer was nearing an end when we got a call from daughter Sandy. Jan had passed peacefully under the blessed care of hospice, husband Bill and family at her side. It was an end we all would choose if we could only choose these things.
Kraig Boyle was only 48 when he died suddenly two days before Christmas. His passing was a shock, but the circumstances are almost as if from a story. A deeply spiritual man, Kraig was taken from this life as he was bringing his family to morning Mass at St. Mary’s in Sleepy Eye. It was at once an odd and beautiful circumstance that his last moments were by the church which was a second home.
My friendship with Kraig began inside that church. I have the 5:00 Wednesday morning hour in the Perpetual Adoration chapel. Kraig had 6:00. Each week, we had time to share during my going and his coming. It was a moment to check in with each other: family, jobs, plans.
Often there was a nod to the presence of Jesus during our visit. And usually humor. Kraig would ask tongue-in-cheek questions with a serious look, then break into his wonderful impish grin.
How was I to know Dec. 21 would be the last time I would share smiles with him?
I spoke of a time of waves, and this has been one for me. I wrote about friend Dean Brinkman passing in September. There came others. Pat Rosenhammer, Colleen Berkner, Renae Bock are all people who bring a smile as I conjure their memories.
Literally as I worked on this, came word of the death of classmate Jerome Tauer. Jerome lived in Arkansas. It was always a pleasant visit when I’d see him back here. A few hours later I heard of Kathy Spaeth passing. Kathy was a sweet, kind person I’ve known since childhood.
I feel like I should hurry and finish this before there’s more.
If you’re my age, you can make your own list. Wakes and funerals are a large portion of my social life. As we advance in age, everyone in our circle is doing the same. It makes sense that death comes to our door more often. You never think about that when you’re young and the only funerals are your friends’ grandparents.
It’s also true that small towns have aging populations. Everyone graduated with larger classes than their school has now. Nursing homes are an opposite story.
COVID accelerated deaths for a time. Historically, pandemics have reduced population in a cruel way. I thought about other times when death rates rose beyond the ordinary. If you graduated in the Sixties, you likely knew young men killed in Vietnam. War is a pandemic that is totally preventable, one that our species never seems to prevent.
There are statistics and trends, but the numbers are real people. And there have been a lot of real people close to me who have left us lately. I told Pam, I feel like there’s more people I knew than I know.
So, what does one do with this sadness?
I’m trying to figure that out. I have texts on my phone from Dean that I’ve saved. I think of Jan when I take things to the food shelf where she volunteered. Wednesdays at Adoration, Kraig is large in mind by his absence.
Each is a reminder of that person. It’s like pings I get on my phone, something briefly called to attention. Pete Hillesheim died in 2007, a best baseball buddy, and I still wonder what he would say about the latest Twins signing.
The sadness never completely fades. When someone is gone, there is a gradual transition to celebrating the memories. With that is the realization that there will be no new ones. It is all past.
A big part of relationships is looking ahead, to what we might do the next time we see each other. There is an open-endedness to every conversation with a friend. There’s a future. “We should have a coffee” or “We should go to a Twins game.” There’s always the next time I’ll see you. Until there’s not.
I suppose, too, the death of someone close is a reminder of our own mortality. Creaking knees and wrinkles in the mirror are hints of that. But losing a friend is a jolt. Conversations after a death of a friend are filled with, “We need to count our blessings,” and “Each day is a gift.” Perhaps living a good and decent life is the best way to honor those who’ve gone before.
Still, there is a heaviness to it, losing these fixtures in our lives. I can easily tear up talking about them, and I do. I think it is common to cry more easily as you age; it is true for many of my friends.
At the same time that there is darkness in loss, we are called to bring light to the world. It almost seems like too much some days. It’s an emotional roller coaster, and you just want it to stop.
I read this recently. Laura Carstensen, a psychologist at the Stanford Center on Longevity, has studied the emotional changes that occur with age. “We find that older people are more likely to report a kind of mosaic of emotions than younger people do. While younger people tend to be ‘all positive or all negative,’ older people are more able to experience joy ‘with a tear in the eye.’”
Joy with a tear in my eye. Sometimes, a lot of tears.
