I find it frustrating that so often grieving is filled with comforting the living, rather than celebrating the dead.
I wonder if the death of another frightens us in such a way that we become fixated on the fragility of LIVING and not just “life” itself.
Suicide seems another matter entirely. Its impact seems to only intensify this reaction to death.
I have been touched multiple times by suicide, my father, my aunt, my patients…and now my friend and lover Gi’. In a very real way, I can identify suicide as a primary factor in my own development. Suicide has shaped who I am: my choice in career, my relationships with others, even my personality.
Suicide has given me a rich appreciation for life, for the impermanence of relationships, the enduring nature of love, and the importance of contributing to society as a whole.
Perhaps I have hit on it, where my frustration lies, it is not in the fixations of others, but rather in my own.
It is difficult to go on living with death on your back (literally and figuratively, I have a calaveras de azucar tattooed on my back); frustrating to look for “life in death” constantly. Yes, it is painful and trying…and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Lately I find myself re-reading the Hume…returning to his and other related work on suicide, with the intent to make philosophical sense of this unthinkable “life”-choice. I found this excerpt…which rings true, for my (our) most recent loss:
Suicide is justified when man’s life, owing to circumstances outside of a person’s control, is no longer possible; an example might be a person with a painful terminal illness, or a prisoner in a concentration camp who sees no chance of escape. In cases such as these, suicide is not necessarily a philosophic rejection of life or of reality. On the contrary, it may very well be their tragic reaffirmation. Self-destruction in such contexts may amount to the tortured cry: “Man’s life means so much to me that I will not settle for anything less. I will not accept a living death as a substitute.” – Leonard Peikoff, Objectism: the philosophy of Ayn Rand
Reading this…I can only envision Gi’ dancing in the spotlight…
And SMILE.
xxx c.
