I've recently gone through one of the hardest experiences of my life.
During the month of December, I made a new friend (a girl who worked at the University) and enjoyed the brief time I was able to spend with her. The getting-to-know-you phase was cut somewhat short by the holidays (I went home for a few weeks), but we still kept in contact. On December 30th, I flew back into town to plan a New Year's Eve party, and picked her up to help buy decorations. About 5 minutes after I had picked her up, I made the turn into my apartment—the same left-handed turn I'd made hundreds of times in a year and a half of living there—and was broadsided by an oncoming car. I was knocked unconscious so there's a good chunk of my memory that's rather blurry (and I remember none of the incident or the supposed other car), but after a few CAT scans and other procedures, I was released, completely fine.
She never made it out of her coma.
The ten days between when the accident happened and when she finally passed were some of the hardest days of my life: wrestling with God, with my emotions, trying to accept what happened. And the days and weeks that have followed have not been any easier. Since that time, I've gone through a complete gamut of emotions: intense guilt followed by sweet peace; sadness and fear that things will never be the same, followed by an optimistic hope and a
knowledge that they would...followed by the confused, gradual, heavy settling that she was
permanently gone and I was powerless to do
anything about it; concern that I had forgotten her and moved on too quickly followed by intense, violent sobbing...
I've also learned a lot about comfort in grief. I've learned that the worst (and yet most common) thing one can ask is "How are you doing?" (Are they using the phrase in its trite, meaningless greeting sense, or do they know what happened—and are they prepared for the floodgates that might be opened in response?)
But most of all, I struggle with the "What can I do for you?" question—which is traditionally followed by "No
really, what can I do for you?" and almost always wrapped up with "Well remember that if you need
anything, I'm just a phone call away." As if repetition and emphasis makes up for the burden they've just (knowingly or otherwise) placed on my already-weary shoulders, the burden of making them—the non-grieving, nonetheless—feel better by offering them control in a situation that for me has been spinning violently out of control for days and weeks and now months... I've since quit telling them, "Well for starters, you can never ask me that ever again," and have instead opted to just smile and thank them for their concern. Sometimes, the simple repeated song is all that humans or birds know how to sing.
In stark contrast, the most meaningful expressions since that day have been in the form of gifts. Gifts I neither asked for nor expected, but sent me to tears nonetheless—tears of appreciation and gratitude and friendship and love. One such gift was the remote to our apartment complex gate, so I could take the back entrance instead of revisiting that same left-hand turn day after day, driving over the fluorescent-green painted lines in the street that shouted to all passers-by "something terrible happened here."
The other gift that meant the world to me was a pair of pants. Someone should have told me when I got on the plane that cold December morning to put on a pair of ragged jeans and a sweatshirt I didn't care about. When they pull you from your totalled vehicle, they don't ask you nicely to lift up your arms as they gently take off your jacket. They don't even spend the time to unbutton your shirt or unzip your pants. Instead, they take scissors (or a knife or bolt cutters or a blow torch or whatever they have handy, I guess) to the lot of it, giving it back to you in a hospital carryout bag like a prize from Dave & Busters. No, they really should have told me not to wear my favorite outfit, to keep my faux leather jacket I still haven't replaced safely hung in the closet, to keep my brand new pair of Bonobos safely unpacked, and to save my favorite flannel shirt for a different chilly Texas day. So when the pants came in the mail (from one of my very best of friends who, despite her attempts at remaining anonymous, left her billing address on the packing slip), I was once again reduced to tears. But this time, they were welcome tears, appreciative tears, and--most important--tears I could experience on my own, in the comfort and privacy of my own car, and at the rate I wanted or did not want.
Maybe this is the way all grief is: the disgust with trivial "checkins," the appreciation of gifts. Or maybe I'm different. In conclusion? Save your favorite outfit for a day when you'll decidedly maintain a comfortable distance from ambulances and paramedics with blow torches. And buy a friend a pair of blue jeans.
