More death
Jul. 5th, 2011 07:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pandora_parrotToo much death lately.
This weekend, a friend of mine killed himself.
I find it confusing to deal with death when the person that has died is not a close friend or relative. If one of my roommates died, or one of my close friends that I see on a regular basis died... I'd know what my reaction would be. I'd understand that I'd be overwhelmed with grief and senses of loss. I'd know that I'd want to attend funeral events and connect with friends and mourn and all that... I'd understand my place in relation to that death.
But what if the person is only someone I see every few weeks? Every few months? A few times a year? What if the last time I saw them was many years ago?
In these situations... I don't understand my grief and my relationship to that grief. I don't understand other people's reaction to my grief.
My friend that died this weekend? It has been nearly a year since I last saw him in person. But we've talked online from time to time, and I'm close to an ex of his, and talk to his wife some. We're not close at all, but he was definitely a friend.
It seems strange to me when people say that they're "sorry for my loss." My loss? He wasn't really mine to lose. He was someone else's... He belonged to a community and collection of friends and relatives and people that interacted with him for more frequently than I. I have only had minimal contact with him in comparison. I feel as though I'm simply on the sidelines of this man's life.
Yet he meant something to me. He was someone I thought fondly of. Our last interaction was an 8 hour conversation that lasted until the wee hours of the morning. I still have a text file on my desktop listing some books he recommended I read on the basis of that conversation.
I have grief. Hell... I've been listless and depressed for the past 3 days over this. I've cried over this.
But I don't get it, and I don't get what it means.
More than my own feelings, I worry about the people closer to him that he leaves behind. How they're doing. His widow. His ex. People that loved him and were with him often.
I'm going to miss him. He was a brilliant and wonderful inventor and security researcher, who did great things for this world. I weep for all of the conversations we're never going to have. I weep for those he left behind. I weep for my loss and the world's loss.
Incidentally... I've been watching a lot of TV to zone out and ignore reality for the past few days. Especially Star Trek The Next Generation. It's amazing to me how much of this stuff deals with death, but besides the simple effect of confirmation bias, I think that it is just a fact that much of human literature and media deal with this question.
What is death... How do we relate to it? What does it mean for there to be an end to *me*? To a given person's consciousness? When another dies, how do we accept the permanent changes in expectations of reality? How do we accept the fact that we will never again meet them? That we will never again interact with them... talk with them... etc.
We're all trying to figure this out and answer our questions about what it all is. And how we deal with it when it impacts our own lives.
I'm going to miss him. He was a fascinating person that I wanted to know better.
This weekend, a friend of mine killed himself.
I find it confusing to deal with death when the person that has died is not a close friend or relative. If one of my roommates died, or one of my close friends that I see on a regular basis died... I'd know what my reaction would be. I'd understand that I'd be overwhelmed with grief and senses of loss. I'd know that I'd want to attend funeral events and connect with friends and mourn and all that... I'd understand my place in relation to that death.
But what if the person is only someone I see every few weeks? Every few months? A few times a year? What if the last time I saw them was many years ago?
In these situations... I don't understand my grief and my relationship to that grief. I don't understand other people's reaction to my grief.
My friend that died this weekend? It has been nearly a year since I last saw him in person. But we've talked online from time to time, and I'm close to an ex of his, and talk to his wife some. We're not close at all, but he was definitely a friend.
It seems strange to me when people say that they're "sorry for my loss." My loss? He wasn't really mine to lose. He was someone else's... He belonged to a community and collection of friends and relatives and people that interacted with him for more frequently than I. I have only had minimal contact with him in comparison. I feel as though I'm simply on the sidelines of this man's life.
Yet he meant something to me. He was someone I thought fondly of. Our last interaction was an 8 hour conversation that lasted until the wee hours of the morning. I still have a text file on my desktop listing some books he recommended I read on the basis of that conversation.
I have grief. Hell... I've been listless and depressed for the past 3 days over this. I've cried over this.
But I don't get it, and I don't get what it means.
More than my own feelings, I worry about the people closer to him that he leaves behind. How they're doing. His widow. His ex. People that loved him and were with him often.
I'm going to miss him. He was a brilliant and wonderful inventor and security researcher, who did great things for this world. I weep for all of the conversations we're never going to have. I weep for those he left behind. I weep for my loss and the world's loss.
Incidentally... I've been watching a lot of TV to zone out and ignore reality for the past few days. Especially Star Trek The Next Generation. It's amazing to me how much of this stuff deals with death, but besides the simple effect of confirmation bias, I think that it is just a fact that much of human literature and media deal with this question.
What is death... How do we relate to it? What does it mean for there to be an end to *me*? To a given person's consciousness? When another dies, how do we accept the permanent changes in expectations of reality? How do we accept the fact that we will never again meet them? That we will never again interact with them... talk with them... etc.
We're all trying to figure this out and answer our questions about what it all is. And how we deal with it when it impacts our own lives.
I'm going to miss him. He was a fascinating person that I wanted to know better.
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no subject
Date: 2011-07-06 03:46 am (UTC)I haven't seen his wife in awhile, but I'm quite close to his ex and have been talking with her at length about the whole mess.
He was doing good in the world on a grand scale. I'm sorry that he had so much pain within him that he felt he had to exit this life.
There is a ripple effect here that will be long felt. *hugs*
no subject
Date: 2011-07-06 04:05 pm (UTC)I know what you mean. It's very difficult for me to process death in a way that others recognize as such -- even with close friends, I've only got a brief period of the usual sort of grief, with crying and the acute sense of loss. With blood relatives or people I'm not extremely close to, it's even more removed.
The loss is the world's, and while he may not have been dear and immediate to you it is nonetheless a loss you share as well. *offers a hug*
*hugs*.
Date: 2011-07-06 07:55 pm (UTC)