Death Fate and Shovels Make
Posted in I have dozens of things to do. Papers to write, proposals, things to analyze, and the usual responsabilities.
I can do none of these things. I am restless. I am bothered. I am searching…if I do not write this, I don’t think I will be able to regain focus.
THE NOW
A few days ago my father-in-law was involved in an unfortunate accident, on his birthday no less. Without going into details it was in no way his fault. No surprise- he is a careful driver, obeys the laws, never reckless. Yet the hands of fate strike when they choose and a 22-year old boy is killed after running into his truck.
22. What a catch. 22
FLASHBACK- Sounds of the shovel.
Many find it odd as a youth in rural West Virginia I had the odd job of digging graves- usually led by grandfather. He is now gone too.
I don’t think people dig graves by hand anymore. Perhaps for their pets, but not for people, not for family or friends. I dug graves for years.
Now we have backhoes, noisy machines that do the work faster and quicker- but without any thought.
Thump. Thump. Scrape. Move a rock.
Thump. Thump. Pitch the soil.
Wipe the sweat from brow and…
Thump. Thump. Scrape.
That is the sound of the shovel on the growing grave we make. If you knew the person
every thump and every scrape has more meaning and gives more cause for reflection.
Dig one and you know. It is the only way I think, but we don’t do it anymore.
And I know we no longer remain to start shoveling the dirt back. That is another sound.
FLASHBACK- The ones you know
As a young man I worked on the EMS squad. Again in rural West Virginia,
where life is hard and opportunities slim. Treacherous roads around the Appalachian mountains still kill many.
Some I knew, some I did not.
When the community “whistle” rang we dropped what we were doing if we could and made it fast to the fire station. Double time, gear swinging from our necks.
Into the rescue truck or fire truck as the case may be.
Firing up lights and grinding gears, cursing and talking to dispatch.
Off- faster and faster- to save someone or something or to what- you never knew.
Now to find that lone car overturned on the back road,
one headlight piercing the dark maybe…
Found. Park. Brake, run and look.
An arm twisted out the window at an angle that is not right- not at all.
Oh the woe when you check inside with the flashlight and search the interior.
When you look through broken glass and you know them, or knew them well.
Not the elderly who have lived long lives.
These are young men, or women or an entire family.
You are somber.
There isn’t anything to say, but we remove them and it begins again.
FLASHBACK- Sailing in fog
Nor was I spared the very same fate as a teenager. Driving back late, after too many hours of work in fog that is thick as pea soup- flowing off
the Guyandotte River that might as well have been the Styx.
I remember the last minutes well, two miles from home, in an area clear of the deep fog
- a large owl flies past me and lights on a tree.
An omen of death I found out later.
Never saw it, the embankment- that deadly incline.
Pitch and roll and smash goes the car- over and over and over.
Thump. Thump. Scrape. Scrape.
Some pain- too much shock, but as above so below and the community responds as I lay- somehow conscious and bleeding fast through a slash across the neck and throat.
Overheard whispers…
“Too much fog to fly him out.”
“He won’t make it.”
“Fourty-five minutes to get an ambulance here and get him to a hospital.”
“We are losing him”.
I could hear it all amplified as I was strangely cold and numb, chuckling to myself.
Calm.
Fully awake and conscious. I knew I was in real trouble and there was nothing,
nothing I could do.
The ambulance arrived, I was cast into the back. I told them I am dieing…
limbs shut down, legs
no feeling, arms the same,
a fog rolls in as the body tries to fight hypovolemic shock.
Going, going, gone into the ether-
that trip is mine and mine alone.
By some miracle revived and put back together.
FLASHBACK- Death is not quiet
I entered into a career as a nurse. Nursing is a job of service and
they are not lauded enough- like teachers. There really is too much
death to even talk about, write about, think about. That is why many seem numb
and callous at times. Over time- it takes a toll- you always lose more than gain.
You see the old, the infirm, the young and worse yet- children. Die.
Some quickly, some slowly, some painfully, and many never made sense
to me. It still does not.
I recall as a student finding a patient dead in their room. We gathered to learn,
as students do, about post-mortem care. I, instead, put my stethescope on
the person’s chest.
No pulse. I kept it in place listening, listening until my instructor ordered the others out.
“What do you hope to hear? This person is gone”, she said.
“I don’t know and won’t know until I listen.”, I replied.
She looked at me and cocked her head to the side, then nodded- left.
I listened. The body is not silent in death. The heart is, but for a long time sounds
are made, liquids and gases, and valves collapsing. Death is not silent at all.
I would not have known had I not listened and paid attention.
Now and Again
So I write and I think, hoping this is some sort of reset. That sharing experiences
like this to anyone who rambles by looking for virtual worlds or web 2.0
will find a dose of something else- different.
It helps bring me to terms as to why someone so young has to die so needlessly-
maybe.
I really should know better- it is the way of things.
For someone who has seen so much death why does it bother me so?
I think, perhaps, that my father-in-law, who was guilty of being only in the
wrong place and at the wrong time, like a young boy killed in his youth it troubles
me on some level. I cannot stop it.
Perhaps that we all take far too much for granted, even the ones who know better.
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I liked this post Wayne. We do take too much for granted. A VERY hard lesson to learn, and easily and often forgotten.
Very thoughtful post. Thanks.
Thank you Jim. I almost corrected the grammar errors and form. Then decided to leave them- leave it all flawed.
Wayne, good writing– I can sense your anguish and restlessness thru your words written here. And I do KNOW it was hard to write…which is good..I think that is something you should keep doing- even the ones you would rather keep without public viewing. Like you said its still a form of “reset”. I do not have all the answers, no Earthly body does. But I do know that I no longer search…I seek more- but no searching, there’s a difference I think. I feel God’s presence and it is gives me a peace that only could be given by something as powerful as God’s grace….yes even during heart wrenching experiences like you have mentioned above. No religious lectures here…just don’t know any other way to explain it. I want you to have that calming feeling so badly but I know its nothing I can make you do, its your heart that has to do the opening up. And even though you may not believe in prayer, I am still praying for you all the time.
Just a quote I have always liked….
You will not grow if you sit in a beautiful flower garden, but you will grow if you are sick, if you are in pain, if you experience losses, and if you do not put your head in the sand. Take the pain as a gift to you with a very, very specific purpose.”
PS how is Kim’s Dad faring?
oh and just one more thing…….
“by some miracle revived and put back together”…..
I think you are right….(I heard the scanner and I hugged the toilet, remember? LOL)
PS i’d like to hear about the trip you made into the ether….if you are ever able to share. some experiences aren’t meant to be one person’s alone.
It’s funny what you think about when something like this happens, my best friend when I was in the fourth grade died similarly, riding his bike behind our church bus, he turned into his road, only to run his bike into the front of my neighbors truck, who was doing probably 35 or 45. I still remember the sounds, the bus driver pulling over, but up the road so we couldn’t see and all of us wondering what was happening. My neighbor did nothing wrong, yet my best friend was gone. I still think about him occasionally, wonder if we would still be friends.
I hope your father in law is okay, as well as you and your family, feel free to call if you need to talk.
That sucks
I am at a loss for words of comfort but that was beautifully expressed Wayne, very moving. I hope you have put it behind you now though, that’s heavy stuff to soak in.
Thanks for posting this, it was a good read and provoked some self-analysis. We should all “stop and smell the roses” more often and enjoy our days.
My deepest sympathies to your father-in-law…I can’t even begin to fathom his personal grief in this tragedy.
You touched a nerve in me when you wrote “I would not have known had I not listened and paid attention.” There is often talk of slowing down when things like this inexplicably happen, and I suppose in a sense it’s true, we must slow down. But so many miss the other part of the equation - we must listen. In our grief, we focus on asking the “why” so much that we can miss the threads of healing that are present for us to discover.
Personally, my beloved grandfather passed away last December from a long illness and although I’ve felt his passing keenly, I found solace in small glimpses of his face and personality in my children. If I had not taken the time to be quiet, listen and observe, I would missed it entirely. Certainly the memories are painful at times, but it is still joyous to see that he is not utterly gone from our lives and for that I am extremely grateful.
I’ll keep your family in my thoughts and prayers.
Very powerful. Great post.
Thanks Wayne.
Wayne,
Thank you so much for sharing.. the insight, the experience, the thoughts to provoke more thinking among others. I keep hearing the same thing week - mostly in my own mind - everyone we come across has a purpose for crossing our path - as to why they cross - we can only ask “why?” and hope we are listening enough to learn.
In my home, we have a dinner ritual -> “what are you thankful for today?” (in lieu of a blessing or grace). Some days its incredibly difficult to think of something positive, so a quiet “I’m thankful for spaghetti” or “I’m glad I have clean socks” might be the answer, and that’s ok.
It’s shared experiences like this, you have shared with us all, that remind me to stop and remember every day why we’re thankful.
I hope tomorrow finds you a whole new day of focus.
Thank you!
jgoode sent me this link. I started a thread last week at a forum that was titled “lifes too short…” and it is. This post proves it. I knew you were an exceptional person, and now I believe it even more. People have been posting in my thread and emailing me saying “thank you I needed that reminder”. Wayne, thank you, we all need that reminder. You know my losses, they are still hard to comprehend some days. And last week I almost lost someone else.
Wayne,
You have faced death many times, and you know that life still continues, you walk past it. It is hard to see dreams and hopes die. Especially if they are hopes and dreams you have for others as well. It is fine to mourn this.
Death is but a phase, a step, a movement from what you know. Remember, that from the ashes rise the phoenix. So this is….
Step back a moment, and look beyond the grief, and see what you have learned. Take it to a new level. Dreams die. Hopes die. But your ability to do both should not. Let what you have learned see with new eyes, hope reborn. It is all a circle, you are not alone. Remember, there is always more than what we know or have known. We are here, so are you.
~~Fey~~
Very good post, Wayne. It does help put things into perspective. Thank you.
Very eloquently written, Wayne, and you’re right, sometimes death, chaos and destruction just appear in our lives and rather than deny its presence, it’s smarter to accept it as part of the grand plan. My thoughts are with your father-in-law and with the parents of the boy who was killed. Tough stuff.
Wow. That hits like a 10 pound hammer on a push pin. Sometimes we need that. Thank you, Wayne.
Wayne you are a gentle soul still carrying the pain from past heartaches. Let it go it does you no good. You search for peace yet deny the One who would give it to you. Open your heart and let him pour His love and healing into your life.
[...] an effort to move on from more morose posts, I will do so. I thank everyone for the deluge of e-mail, comments, IM and even phone calls. Some [...]
Why did I have to go and forget to fill in an answer…
*smacks face*
Lemme try this again
I wrote something really nice and long and sweet and it got deleted >.
[...] (counting e-mails, IMs, skypes, comments, virtual conversations, etc) from this one piece on “Deaths and Shovels”. than hundreds previous combined. Real feedback, the type of sharing that changes one’s world [...]
Wayne, thanks for pointing me to this post today. It resonates SO much to me: I was in an accident as a teen (not so severe), and in part it prompted me to become a paramedic. I was on the other end for six years, and it was one of the most powerful things I have ever done to learn about life. I saw people at their best, and at their worst. I saw people that couldn’t afford to live in slums, and people who lived in exquisite houses on the edge of the bay looking at San Francisco. When people are hurting, a lot of the bullshit falls away and you see the essence of the person. I learned that people are a lot alike whether they have money, education, intelligence — or not. Like you, I learned a lot about the body, and both how fragile and resilient it is. And you can bet that experience made me a better writer, as well as understanding people a lot better.
And now that I’ve paid my dues and “made it”? Yep, I went back: I’m a volunteer medic.