Grief- swallowed up - 10 years old
Yesterday I went to a nurses pinning ceremony (nursing school graduation). I was invited to lead a blessing of the hands and then for any graduating nurses offer an annointing of their hands.
After a fair amount of hooing and haa -ing I got a draft written, revised it, and revised it to the point of good. I'll be the first to admit it was a bit too verbose and I overused the word pivotal but in general it was very good.
But in my pondering this, pondering the touch of nurses, the people they touch the work they do I started wondering what the last hands were that touched my Dad (before he died). I wondered about the nurses and doctors that accompanied him through the surgery to take out his organs. I wondered what hands were his final live touch. Did those hands take a minute, second, or moment to honor the body that held his life? Was it a perfunctory touch, simply moving on to the next touch, or did those final touches acknowledge a sacred passing.
I don't know.
I'll never know.
But I sat in the car yesterday, in my fully alive body, and felt the hole of my grief open up.
It was like inside of me their is typically a minnow (grief) , and then the minnow opened it's mouth to let the grief out and the mouth opened up as a large and vast as a whale. I sat at a red light, at the intersection of Cherry and 12th in Seattle and wept. As loudly as I did in those first months, as raw I was in the first year. There I was again, sitting in the same pile of feelings.
That pile of feelings, that giant opening inside of me closed up almost as quickly as it opened up. When I arrived at my destination 4 blocks later I was back to functional, and bordering on normal.
Today there is still a pool of emotion when I consider my Dad's final moment. When I ponder the final touch the may have received. But it's the grief of 10 years. Right there like a minnow, ready to swallow a moment, not swallowing my whole days.
After a fair amount of hooing and haa -ing I got a draft written, revised it, and revised it to the point of good. I'll be the first to admit it was a bit too verbose and I overused the word pivotal but in general it was very good.
But in my pondering this, pondering the touch of nurses, the people they touch the work they do I started wondering what the last hands were that touched my Dad (before he died). I wondered about the nurses and doctors that accompanied him through the surgery to take out his organs. I wondered what hands were his final live touch. Did those hands take a minute, second, or moment to honor the body that held his life? Was it a perfunctory touch, simply moving on to the next touch, or did those final touches acknowledge a sacred passing.
I don't know.
I'll never know.
But I sat in the car yesterday, in my fully alive body, and felt the hole of my grief open up.
It was like inside of me their is typically a minnow (grief) , and then the minnow opened it's mouth to let the grief out and the mouth opened up as a large and vast as a whale. I sat at a red light, at the intersection of Cherry and 12th in Seattle and wept. As loudly as I did in those first months, as raw I was in the first year. There I was again, sitting in the same pile of feelings.
That pile of feelings, that giant opening inside of me closed up almost as quickly as it opened up. When I arrived at my destination 4 blocks later I was back to functional, and bordering on normal.
Today there is still a pool of emotion when I consider my Dad's final moment. When I ponder the final touch the may have received. But it's the grief of 10 years. Right there like a minnow, ready to swallow a moment, not swallowing my whole days.
*big hugs* So beautifully said, as always.
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