I saw dead people. And they suck.
I have never been to an open casket funeral. That was the thing that first broke off a piece of my heart today and smashed it on the floor.
I went alone to the funeral, after at least an hour of outfit changes, which was strangely important to me. What would he want me to wear? I can't wear a retro dress with modern shoes. That would offend his thiftshop sensibilities. In the end i chose the perfect outfit. One that he would have been proud of.
Today was such a profound, life-changing day for me i don't think i can put it in words. But i need to try.
It is different going to a funeral for someone who killed themselves. Different for me.
There was lots of talk in eulogies of people being happy that he had ended his torment, that he had found a cure for the buzzing in his head. I listened to these people, breaking down in tears, grown men reduced to empty hearted vessels before their friend laying lifeless in a coffin. I cried so many tears. Tears for Jeremy, tears for my friends and the pain he had caused them, tears for myself - knowing that at so many points in time it could have been me up there in that wooden box. Tears of anger. I wanted to stand up and yell that it was not okay. He had not found a way to end his pain. He had ended his life. His pain is gone, but so are the fourty years of happiness he could have had in between. The children, the nieces, the friends, the unknown.
And there we all were. Insignificant. Sad and crying. It doesn't matter if it was 200 or 2,000 people. It is a tragedy. A life lost. A life he let go. And it makes me mad. It makes me jealous.
I have wanted to let go. Many times. And the fact that he did makes me not just sad, but envious. He didn't fight the fight.
He didn't tell everybody that it was possible. Beauty. In the midst of sadness. He let go of okay.
If he let's go, if we all let go. What is left. There is no beauty. There is no beauty without pain. No joy without sadness. No love without loss.
And here i am. On the cusp of spring. Listening to the frogs outside. Driving down the malahat through snow to a bright and sunny victoria day. And here i am. And i feel like this is all fucked up. My heart torn out and smashed on the ground in the most beautiful church on vancouver island just at that moment when i thought life could get better.
I saw dead people.
Posted by Jess at 08:43 PM Permalink
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When I read "Jeremy"... I kind of knew it would be THAT Jeremy. I mean how many Jeremys are out there?!!Terrible sad news!!! Being that we circled the same people, but just missed each other for some reason.
I bought my first Vespa from him... My heart just sunk at this very moment. You were very brave to go alone & then to even view him. Poor Jeremy. He would have been happy to know that you paid your respects.
Jeremy is in the big sky cruisin' in the dopest lowrider ever!!! Hopefully at peace with himself now.
I'm sorry you had to feel all these things today.
Death is so hard.
Posted by jenelle | February 20, 2007 10:16 PM