Dying
My friend is dying.
Really, I suppose, he's more my partner's friend than mine. More really, he is part of the extended "chosen" family of my husband, so I suppose he is really sort of an in-law of mine. We are close in a familial way... it isn't that S. and I have so many shared secrets or that we have done so many things together. It's more that I have known him as family for several years... that he has been to my wedding and noticed my children and laughed at me knitting. My partner always tells me how much S. likes me, and S. always tells me how happy he is to see me, how beautiful I look (even when I look like the ninth level of Hell), how happy he is that J. and I found each other. I love him, and it is a quiet and comfortable love, a deep affection.
My friend is dying.
In the hospital the other day, I knitted and he told me stories about how he and my husband first became friends, about the 1930s and '40s style drag he did when he was young and beautiful, about his lover who died, about all of our mutual friends and family. He told us that way back when, people would knit intricate jewelry from the hair of their deceased, called mourning jewelry. He complained about the bugs on the ceiling that the morphine makes him see. He asked what we would do without him. It isn't fair, he said. It isn't fair. He said maybe he could beat this thing after all.
My friend is dying.
There is no chance of S. beating this. Cancer has eaten him up inside. He has three weeks or less to live. Now he's moved out of the hospital and into the home of friends in our neighborhood. They've known each other for 15 or 20 years. This couple will hospice him. S. is on a morphine drip constantly. He can press a button for more morphine every five minutes. The morphine has to be with him all the time, so it comes in a little canvas pouch, sort of like a camera bag or a square fanny pack. He complained about how hideous the morphine case is. He'd like to have it in a evening bag, I think. He asked a friend (and now, a caretaker) if he could use her Versace bag, but she said no way! Maybe we'll go to the Coach store and get a decent bag for it, he said. I used to have a lovely Coach bag, he remembered. They can't expect a queen like me to carry this ugly thing! he moaned.
For more than 20 years, he's fought off the AIDS he was diagnosed with in the early '80s. Now, an non-AIDS-related cancer will take him. He's right: that isn't fair.
He says he doesn't know what he thinks about God. He hasn't had time to decide, he says. What do I say to him? I know She waits for him, the Dark Mother, as she waits for us all, to receive each one back into our source. He tells me I'm the only religious person he knows. I have no experience with this. I've never seen or sat with the dying. I've never ministered this passage. But now I feel called upon to do so. What can I offer? I sit with him and hold his hand and bless him and pray, pray, pray for him to know peace, for him to be filled with love, for Quan Yin to soothe his brow with Her gentle touch, for Her to pour Her waters of mercy over him and relieve his pain and suffering. But whatever I can do cannot be enough.
I pray that his passing may be gentle and that the Goddess receives him sweetly. In love may he return again. So mote it be.
Really, I suppose, he's more my partner's friend than mine. More really, he is part of the extended "chosen" family of my husband, so I suppose he is really sort of an in-law of mine. We are close in a familial way... it isn't that S. and I have so many shared secrets or that we have done so many things together. It's more that I have known him as family for several years... that he has been to my wedding and noticed my children and laughed at me knitting. My partner always tells me how much S. likes me, and S. always tells me how happy he is to see me, how beautiful I look (even when I look like the ninth level of Hell), how happy he is that J. and I found each other. I love him, and it is a quiet and comfortable love, a deep affection.
My friend is dying.
In the hospital the other day, I knitted and he told me stories about how he and my husband first became friends, about the 1930s and '40s style drag he did when he was young and beautiful, about his lover who died, about all of our mutual friends and family. He told us that way back when, people would knit intricate jewelry from the hair of their deceased, called mourning jewelry. He complained about the bugs on the ceiling that the morphine makes him see. He asked what we would do without him. It isn't fair, he said. It isn't fair. He said maybe he could beat this thing after all.
My friend is dying.
There is no chance of S. beating this. Cancer has eaten him up inside. He has three weeks or less to live. Now he's moved out of the hospital and into the home of friends in our neighborhood. They've known each other for 15 or 20 years. This couple will hospice him. S. is on a morphine drip constantly. He can press a button for more morphine every five minutes. The morphine has to be with him all the time, so it comes in a little canvas pouch, sort of like a camera bag or a square fanny pack. He complained about how hideous the morphine case is. He'd like to have it in a evening bag, I think. He asked a friend (and now, a caretaker) if he could use her Versace bag, but she said no way! Maybe we'll go to the Coach store and get a decent bag for it, he said. I used to have a lovely Coach bag, he remembered. They can't expect a queen like me to carry this ugly thing! he moaned.
For more than 20 years, he's fought off the AIDS he was diagnosed with in the early '80s. Now, an non-AIDS-related cancer will take him. He's right: that isn't fair.
He says he doesn't know what he thinks about God. He hasn't had time to decide, he says. What do I say to him? I know She waits for him, the Dark Mother, as she waits for us all, to receive each one back into our source. He tells me I'm the only religious person he knows. I have no experience with this. I've never seen or sat with the dying. I've never ministered this passage. But now I feel called upon to do so. What can I offer? I sit with him and hold his hand and bless him and pray, pray, pray for him to know peace, for him to be filled with love, for Quan Yin to soothe his brow with Her gentle touch, for Her to pour Her waters of mercy over him and relieve his pain and suffering. But whatever I can do cannot be enough.
I pray that his passing may be gentle and that the Goddess receives him sweetly. In love may he return again. So mote it be.
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My prayers are the same as yours. You are so strong to share this. You've just put my entire day into perspective. Thank you.
Posted by
Amie |
4:44 PM
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