Time Passing

                                 Forgive my grief for one removed,

                                    Thy creature whom I found so fair.

                                     I trust he lives with Thee and there

                                  I find him worthier to be loved.

                                                                     ~Tennyson

Given but six months to live, it was after 11 months that my nephew, Michael, passed away.  He went more "gentle into that good night" than anyone might have hoped, but -- shall it be said? -- not without dying, which is what must be faced, what must be endured [Link].  Obviously.  Yet through those months, I saw bravery.

He distinguished himself not only in his stamina of enduring those 11 long months, but also in the dignity with which he passed that time -- and more.

He had been in a coma for a about a day before his passing, and so through the night.  In mid-morning his breathing slowed.  He then opened his eyes and looked momentarily at his parents, who had knelt by his bed when they heard the change in his breathing.  With what must have been an immense act of will, given his inability to move muscles and the fact that he had not eaten anything for 49 days, he gave one final nod to his parents in farewell, and within three seconds was gone.

One quote from the cynical House M.D. is, "You can live with dignity.  You can't die with it."  House, in this case, for all his Holmesian attributes, was simply wrong; this 13-year-old boy proved him so.  Science can't explain everything. It knows nothing of the spirit.

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

                                   Hamlet (1.5.166-7)

An early entry in this blog concerns the red thread [Link] -- a thread connecting us regardless of where we may be within time and space.  I don't believe time or even eternity is strong enough to break that thread.  Perhaps the sole event possessing the power to break our connections with others is within an act that disregards human connectedness and Love that wove the thread.  I mean Love Incarnate, seen within daily acts of love which carry Him and connectedness to others.

The thread remains, but death?  Well, I'm not sure if it's slack in the line or an uncommon pull upon it.  No matter which it is, both hurt.  It doesn't hurt quite so much given that he lived and loved well, endured with faith and dignity, and distinguished himself in passing.  Should he have relinquished Love or human connectedness, the pain of that broken thread would be something more severe.  But no: here is the line, still connected, still present.

Going Hence....

Men must endure
Their going hence, even as their coming hither....

Shakespeare, King Lear, V.ii

This blog is about journeys, including the last journey.  Shakespeare knew this journey somehow too intimately.

One of the things that distinguishes Shakespeare among even today's writers is his nuanced use of ambiguity.  He allows us to peel back layers of meaning that exist, often, within a single line.  His ambiguity in the word "their" in this quote from Lear shows Shakespeare's intimacy with the problem: that we must endure both coming into the world and leaving it.  Look:

Does he mean "Men must endure their [own] going hence"?

Or

Does he mean that we who live "must endure their [our loved ones'] going hence"?

Yes -- both meanings, I believe.  And it's an arduous thing to endure for both the one who departs and for the one who remains.

The character who delivers the line is Edgar, who leads Gloucester towards what he supposes will be his death.  Edgar asks his ward, "What, in ill thoughts again?  Men must endure/Their going hence, even as their coming hither:/Ripeness is all: come on."

And the dual meanings here are multiplied: we not only endure our own and others' going hence, just as we endured coming into this world, but we must also endure the people "coming hither" into our world who will offer only malfeasance (as so many characters do in Lear ); these persons are mere travesties of the attributes that make a human to be [link] in the most positive sense.  The presence of such people is all but impossible to endure once it's clear to us just what they are and what harm their presence brings.

My nephew, Michael, came into this world as one of the happiest beings I have seen, and he was ever so.  I have seen him delight at simple things encountered in this world, and I have known him to be as innocent a soul as I'd ever met.

Beaming Boy

He was a delight to play with in his infancy and toddlerhood, and growing older he has distinguished both his life after coming hither and his life going hence with a dignity uncommon to a young man.  Not to raise him above being merely human or to idealize, but he's been quite a fine lad.

I have known people who attempted to endow their departure (or, more accurately, their funeral) with a dignity that their lives failed to warrant.  That is a vanity decorated with funereal baubles -- a sham of empty ornamentation.  I have heard of, read about, and have met others who departed without a dignified remembrance -- with little-to-no recognition of the dignity with which they led their lives.

It is rare when these two balance: a dignified endurance of going hence at the end of a life lived in dignity.  That this balance exists with Michael has been emphatic to me as I consider his short life and his long endurance in passing.

His days grow short -- probably a mere few now.  And both he, and we along side, endure his going hence.

Michael, Thanksgiving 2011

 Michael, Dec. 2011

Chosing to BE.

A few years ago in my Shakespeare course, we had finished discussing Hamlet just as spring break approached.  In returning from the break, I asked students what they had done during their vacation that was exciting.  One student said, "I got a tattoo."  On her calf, just above the ankle in a very simple typewriter font, were two words and a period:

Just like that.  It took me a second to get the affirmation.  The student remarked that she had thought very seriously about Hamlet's question -- whether to remain in existence, albeit having to face life's many troubles, or to die and sleep, "perchance to dream" through eternity, a prospect bringing up other questions ("what dreams may come?"  They might be a hell of perpetual nightmares, worse than any trouble life might bring).

She said it was better to live, live fully -- and To be through it all, no matter what life brought along.

I am still today impressed by that tattoo.  Not being tatted myself, if I ever were to get inked, those two words might be an apt statement.

The significance lies in the undercurrent of those small words.  My nephew, as some of you know, has had his fate decided for him (unlike Hamlet, who wishes that his flesh would melt and allow him a quick end).  Michael has brain cancer.  He was given -- at the end of March -- 6 months to live, but things seem to be moving faster than expected.  Daily he weakens, can scarcely stand without holding onto something, whereas mere weeks ago he could hit a baseball (although not run the bases).  His right arm and hand are debilitated.  His face muscles have stopped working, so he has no expression even in laughter, no ability to smile.  His brain is incredibly sharp, but his body fails in new ways daily.

This is, obviously, hard to watch -- but how infinitely more so for him to watch?  At thirteen...?  And this week he grew very angry at it all.  Yes, indeed.  We all are.  But where does one direct anger at being dealt such an unfair hand?  I recall Dylan Thomas's poem:  "Do not go gentle into that good night....  Rage, rage against the dying of the light."

It is a choice, "to BE."  It may be that one's fate is decided, and the decision is that "you shall not be."  But to BE until that time -- Michael chooses every day to be.  It may be to accept; it may be to be angry.  But he still chooses: to BE.

His cancer is not unheard of.  Another young person to have this cancer was Elena Desserich [Link].  She spent her last months in an affirmative decision to be.  She wrote notes to her mother, father, and sister Grace -- even as her ability to write and draw deteriorated.  Elena hid her notes all over the Deserrichs' house, so her family would continue to find them long after she was gone.

One of Elena's Notes

Is it possible "to take arms against a sea of troubles and by opposing end them," as Hamlet asks?  Is it possible to war against this disease and by opposing end it?  To quote E. M. Forster (writing about the sea of troubles inherent in human relations), "Not now.  Not yet."  But even still, to look on these troubles, on this disease, and to be overwhelmed, to be put off of living in the face of it all, to "lose the name of action" as Hamlet says?  Not so.

Hamlet's decision is the hardest question we face whether living or dying.  If dying, we must BE.  If living, we must BE.  It is not to divert ourselves from troubles but to face them, clear eyed, honestly, not least -- as Michael teaches me -- bravely.  He's a soldier doing his duty in the midst of the hardest imaginable situation.  And, as Milton observed, "they also serve who only stand and wait."

Michael, BEing: Right Seat, UH-60 Blackhawk