Gribbski's Guide to the Fat Galaxy: Six

Hey guys, this is the WW. I am stealing the blog for a post not at all related to body positivity, but it is still about something important and close to me. All names have been deleted for privacy, etc.

Please give it a read!

Six

To Hannah

Six years ago, I returned home from a weekend trip to Osage Beach, Missouri. I think that’s why I feel so inspired to write this after so many years of simply acknowledging the day; I’m in a place that will forever remind me of grief and loss.

Six years ago last Wednesday, I had a Goodbye Summer party in the park by my house. I remember thinking that no one would show because it seemed like that happened a lot when I made an event. I was not very confident at seventeen.

Six years ago last Wednesday, that boy with the big hair (all names but yours have been excluded for privacy) showed up first, and I didn’t know him well, so I remember us sitting awkwardly in the pavilion while we waited for others to arrive and relieve the awkward tension. You were the first.

Six years ago last Wednesday, you hopped out of the car, perhaps with a “Bye, Mom” tossed behind you, but I can’t remember details like that. What I can remember is the relief I felt that YOU had arrived, someone I loved and could talk to, someone who also knew and loved the boy with the big hair.

Six years ago last Wednesday, we played on the playground (I probably got stuck on top of the monkey bars because that happened a lot) and we wrote our names with a suffix of –butt in chalk all over the pavilion and we climbed trees and we ate mystery chips.

Six years ago last Wednesday, you stood suddenly from the picnic circle, declaring that you had to go hang out with some other friends, and despite our pleading for you to stay, you went anyway.

Six years ago last Wednesday, I gave you the laziest hug, because who ever thinks to do a real, love-filled, fierce hug at every goodbye?

Six years ago last Wednesday, my party ended and we all split up. I remember doing stupid things, like playing the five-clicks game on Wikipedia. I also remember doing exciting, important things, like planning activities for the Gay-Straight Alliance, the group that a mutual friend and I would be co-presidents of in our upcoming senior year of high school. I remember walking home at the end of the night in my bare feet. I remember sliding my cell phone under my pillow like I always did. I remember listening to my family go to bed.

Six years ago last Wednesday, I was falling asleep in my bed when my life jarringly changed forever. It was the vibration under my pillow that woke me up, and the voice on the other end telling me that you had died.

Six years ago last Wednesday after that phone call, everything was a haze, with only flashes of memory returning now as I write this. I remember…

Waking my parents as I clutched my cell phone with your name still lingering on the other side, still clinging to the word death

Walking into the living room of the friend who called to see everyone sobbing and clinging to each other and the tv was on

Spending the next who-knows-how-many days at our friend’s house with everyone else, crying and remembering and missing you

Going back to the park to see our names written by you in the chalk and immortalizing them with film

Going on long walks with our group

Six years ago, I didn’t stay for your funeral. I agreed to continue with my prior plans to come to Osage Beach to visit my Missouri family. I remember feeling lost in the airport and trying to cover up my face as I cried so I wouldn’t have to talk to anyone about it, but then no one asked, so I cried freely.

Six years ago, I thought it was my fault because it was my party that you left.

Five years ago, I really came to terms with the fact that it wasn’t my fault, but I still hated that lazy hug I gave you. I remember blowing up 99 red balloons because that was the thing we did to honor you. I numbered each one so I wouldn’t lose track.

Four years ago, I wrote you a letter that I never sent.

Three years ago, I probably wrote a facebook status about you and cried that day.

Two years ago, I looked at your pictures and thought about your family. I missed you, but I also couldn’t remember everything about you. I realized that even though we were friends and I knew you, I didn’t know you as well as I should have, considering how much your death impacted me. I felt some guilt for publicly acknowledging the day, like I wasn’t allowed to grieve for as long as everyone else because our connections when you were alive were not as deep as the ones they were talking about.

One year ago, I started student teaching. I remembered you, but I remembered you from a distant and detached point. I thought about how the seniors I saw in the hallways could have gone through something similar. I watched other students deal with grief and loss and I thought about how I did the same when I was their age.

Last Wednesday, I didn’t even realize what day it was until I got home around 8. I had a long and wonderful and emotional day at work, but I don’t think there’s ever a day that isn’t emotional when you work with traumatized teenagers. My girls put on a play and I cried because I was so proud of how hard they worked and because of the support they offered me when I was stressed at the beginning. After I got home and I logged in to facebook, it hit me. All kinds of remembrance posts. Sad, but also fondly reminiscent. I spent the rest of the week thinking about what your life would have been like, about that day six years ago that stole your future from you, and about the ways we grieve. I realized that I was still operating under the delusion that I was not allowed to post on social media about you, because that would be attention-seeking and not at all validating or comforting. I tried a million times to compose a status that captured everything I felt, but I’m wordsy and it was impossible.

I realized that even though we may not have been the best of friends during your life, your death was intimately connected to my growth. This is not to say that if you hadn’t died, I wouldn’t have grown. This is to say that there should not be social rules about grief, like who is allowed to grieve, for how long, and in which way. Death affects us all, and everyone has a different way of dealing with it.

I will always remember you, even if I can’t remember exactly what you sounded like when we shouted at that cat (Mr. Love Kitty!) or exactly how you felt when we hugged. I will always wish that day six years ago had never happened, that somehow I would have been able to persuade you to stay. I will always feel a little broken when I think of that phone call. I will always think of your family in the summertime and hope they are healing and well and surrounded by people they love.