Everything, at some point or another, dies. People obviously pass away, unfortunately at any age. Animals die, plants die, even food goes bad. But this is an absurdly hard concept for anyone to wrap their head around.
Recently, my grandmother passed away and I found my self at a loss of emotion. I knew I was supposed to be sad, and I knew I would miss her, but I wasn’t crying. My brother and my parents and my sister all seemed to react normally and I found myself in this weird numb state of sadness with no thought process. Everyone was apologizing to me for my loss but nothing had kicked in yet.
I was home alone and all I really wanted to do was watch Orange is the New Black because it had just come out but I didn’t know if I was supposed to mourn or just go to bed. Was I going to hell for not respecting the night that I was informed of her death? I tried to ignore everything in my mind and forget about everything and carry on but then I started to just think about death and there was no turning back.
Where do you go? Does the world just turn black and that’s the end, no thought process or anything? Do you rise above the clouds and into the sunshine to watch over everyone to watch over their lives like in the movies? I’m only 17 but I know that I am nowhere near being able to understand and accept death.
I finally was able to reach one of my friends and he told me “you just kinda got to keep moving, and don’t think of it as not seeing them again, but reuniting with them when its your turn so it’s less scary.” Which is somewhat of an optimistic and pessimistic thing at the same time. You are going to die at some point and that’s not great to think about, but when you do die you’ll be reunited with the ones you love.
At the funeral, everyone told me that they were sorry for my loss, but the sad thing is that I hadn't know what I had lost. My grandmother's health had been bad ever since I was born so i never got to meet the real her. I met the foggy, delusional, and forgetful version of what the rest of my family knew as a wonderful woman. I never knew her as the amazing mom and wife that she was and I never grew particularly close to her no matter how much time we spent together.
She would say things sometimes that would be insulting to me but I knew that she just couldn't filter her thoughts anymore and I would get angry at her instead of sympathizing, and I am regretful of that. The last thing she said to me was, "Are yin lazy?" when I told her I wasn't taking precalculus my senior year in high school, and I shrugged her away to her grave.
I know that my grandmother died peacefully with those who cared about her by her side, but it makes me feel that much worse for those people on earth who have to accept the death of their loved ones who pass not as easily.
