325. Love, death and not quite robots

The past month has brought a whirlwind of emotions. Does anyone remembers the movie Four Weddings and a Funeral?  It demonstrates a bit of how I feel in terms of how quickly I’ve been switching emotional gears. Plus any opportunity to bring up a random 90s Hugh Grant Rom Coms is a plus. My good friend and Make Us Visible cofounder shared a WaPo article on a guide to feeling happier everyday. In the article it mentions something called Joy Snacks. Little bite size morsels of joy to keep us happy, hold us over or remind us that it’s going to be ok! This is exactly what 80s and 90s rom coms are…joy snacks. The article also discusses gratitude, which as many of you know, O and I consistently discuss as the solution to all things negative. When we are practicing gratitude, it’s tough to be angry, sad, frustrated, etc.  The difficulty is feeling grateful when those emotions arise. My godfather passed away a few weeks ago. I describe my feelings after trauma or loss as muted.  While I see death as sad, Oscar and I have marveled in what  experienced during my uncle’s passing. He truly received the grandest of goodbyes. Without going into too much detail of his health issues or decline, I was grateful to have shared moments with him while he was at his best and worst. In his final days, he was no longer able to communicate, but he passed away in his home, surrounded by so – so much love. Several years ago, I spent time taking care of an uncle in hospice where we witnessed so many people dying alone. That was both depressing and insightful.  People die alone everyday. My godfather spent the last 5 days of his life with his children, grandsons, nieces, nephews and friends visiting him and showering him with blessings and love. It inspires me to think about the way in which the family supported one another.  Seeing them laugh and cry through memories and the extraordinary care he received was truly a sight to behold. I can’t paint a picture that captures the intensity and solemnity of those moments. You just had to be there. Watching his grandsons collectively pick him up to rotate him (even though they didn’t all have to do it at the same time) was amazing.  When I think about family being there for one another, that image will forever be seared into my brain. The funeral was joyous and moving, and naturally, sad. I believe funerals are for the living. We take that moment to honor the deceased, but really, it is a time for the living to share in their sorrow and reminisce on the good times. Selfishly, someone dying makes me think of my own mortality. It’s inevitable especially when I am much closer as years go on and I have elderly family members. I can’t recall how much I have shared about my anxieties and fears of death, but I’ve had to work through dealing with it through years of therapy. Shout out to the best therapist in the world who has helped me go from someone who would have panic attacks in the middle of the night thinking about death, to someone who can now talk about it on air. My biggest fears were not just about me dying, but the loss of those that I love. I used to think that I had to choose between death being: scary or not scary, good or bad, etc.  However, I think all is true.  Death can be scary, inspiring, inevitable, finite and whatever else it means to us. Instead of focusing on death, I now try to focus on living.  Whenever someone dies, I think about how I want to live the years I have left and who I want to share those precious moments with.  It’s a not-so-gentle reminder that our time here is fleeting.