Eulogy

I’ve been asked by Betty, Kim’s mom, to express how deeply grateful she, and we are, that you came here today to share all of our love, and our sorrow.

I’d like to open with an invocation from my tradition which generates love and compassion: “May all beings have happiness May they be free from suffering May they find the joy that has never known suffering May they be freed from attachment and hatred”

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Kim and I used to giggle about people who got ordained out of the back of Rolling Stone magazine. I would always joke that “oh yeah, they’re a minister from that Church of the Brighter Light”. When I got ordained it was totally different. Well for one thing, it now happens over the internet. For another I fancied myself to be this really cool someone, who really should be officiating marriages. Cuz how much fun is that? I’m guessing that had I thought a little more seriously about it, or actually gone to a Divinity School it might have occurred to me that the not fun, flip side, would be potentially officiating at funerals, memorials and wakes. And it certainly never, ever, crossed my mind that the first one of such occasions would be the memorial for one of my oldest, dearest, friends.

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Kimberly - She had so many brilliant, jewel-like qualities.

Her mind was quirky, creative, quixotic. She could handle herself in almost any conversation - from the best way to get a really moist carrot cake, to the fine points of metaphysical philosophy, to teaching a kid some vital life skill like reading, shoe tying, or just the right spots to hang the decorations on the christmas tree. Had she had a meaner spirit, her sardonic wit and sly, charismatic laugh, could have earned her a spot at the Algonquin’s Round-table.

Highly intuitive, Kim could read other people, and their situations, piercing through facades and bringing to light underlying realities. And like so many of us, it was always easier to see for others, than to see oneself.

She was extra-ordinarily empathic. The worlds suffering was her suffering. She was always taking in strays. Of every race, creed, and breed.

Kim was generous to a fault. She used to literally give me the clothes off her back, by the armload. She was basically what we now would call my stylist when I was 18. Although I learned later that perhaps it was more Betty who was technically behind that, whether she was aware of it or not...

She deeply enjoyed the rituals around food, whether it be gourmet at The Earle, exotic like her favourite Indian food or just plain good cookin’ like a Manikas omelet or her Nana’s chicken and dumplings. Making and sharing it, trying new foods and recipes, going to restaurants to socialize with good food and beverages at the center, as well as all the traditional holiday feasts, even when she couldn’t fully participate, warmed her, cheered her, and nourished her soul to simply be around and involved in such activities.

She passionately loved art, and music, and books.

Theatre and movies.

Saints and sinners

Because most of all, Kim loved.

She constantly surprised me when she would offhandedly comment “well but of course I do love him - her - them” whomever. I thought that maybe this capacity she had, to love “sinners” just “not their sins”, was kind of foolish, and possibly, probably, dangerous. In reality? It was daunting. I was a little shamed by her ability to generate genuine love for people I considered useless, a waste of time or too big of a problem. She always ended our phone conversations with “I love you” or “I love you Laurie”. I, having grown up in a family that was never expressive in that way, initially would always awkwardly say “yaloveyatoobye”. It really took me a long time to learn to say, sincerely, with real feeling, “I love you too Kim”.

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Nowadays we’ve all been exposed to some Jungian psychology, often under the guise of new age philosophy, as Jung wrote compellingly of learning to live with one’s own shadow side. The ideas of having compassion for oneself, learning to understand and accept one’s shadow in order to become a fully integrated human is now a common and accepted methodology for becoming humane, forgiving oneself, and moving into balance.
What has not been quite so humanely articulated, written about, and subsequently served to us, the questing friends and families, is how to deal with the shadow in others.

We’ve been bombarded with some very popular theories of how to conduct our relationship to people who seem to want, need or to be under some compulsion to, live primarily from their shadow. We are told, and our own experiences frequently appears to reflect that, trying to help people who seem to be becoming lost there, is pretty much like shouting down a well.

We’ve seen talk shows, read books, and been immersed up to our eyebrows with the advices of mass psychology instructing us in methods of “tough love”, “codependent no more”, “dealing with toxic people” and other, sort of, one size fits all, approaches to these relationships. Realistically, these are likely to be some of the most complex and painful, intimate relationships we will experience in our lifetimes. These are the relationships that have asked us, and potentially will continue to ask, throughout the years, What if...? Why didn’t I..? And, if only...?

It’s no wonder that we’ll eagerly try out all these various techniques. When nothing else seems to work, when we find ourselves baffled, desperate, and really, very terribly, afraid, solutions that assure us that they are almost surefire are very appealing. Not to mention that if we don’t have some recognized theory or technique that we can claim to be utilizing, we ourselves run the risk of being socially and psychologically bullied, belittled, and labeled with some catchy buzzword which infers that as we are clearly not being part of a trendy solution we therefore must be part of the problem.

I don’t have any one solution to offer here. The problems are too complex, the circumstances too individual. But I have come to feel that the usual approaches of becoming insular, preserving our self above others, trying to remain in, or restore ourselves to, a pain free state are potentially not as helpful or as safe as some would claim.

We are come to this life to learn, and these terribly painful moments are some of our most defining, learning, moments. These teaching moments have the potential to become like fruits of the vine, with precious juices that blend together, and processed thoughtfully, carefully, with love and compassion for self and others can become a rather heady wine of a profound, personal, understanding of life, living, and death. Mark that it must processed carefully though, as any wine that is not lovingly handled can turn and become vinegar. Just as our love can turn bitter without that large dose of compassion for self and others.

I have learned maybe two basic things so far from my work with the dying, the living, and those balanced there, trembling, with only one breath separating the one from the other:

One is simply that no one can, or should, micromanage anyone else’s life or death. People need to make their own choices about their living and dying even if those choices bewilder us. All we can do is offer our very best and truest information to them and let them proceed to work it out from there.

Another is that - people do the best they can at the time, or they would have done better, period.

This is true of others, this is true of ourselves. Everyone here did the best they could in each moment. If there is something in your heart of hearts that whispers to you “I could have made a bigger effort, I could have tried harder, if only, if only.... well I’m not going to give you the easy task and tell you to just let it go, instead I will ask you to take on the harder but much more rewarding job of holding and remembering that feeling, in order to learn from it, so that another time you’ll be able to let it be the spark that ignites greater effort, inspires you to greater compassion, and subsequently creates one billion better moments, for yourself and for others.

For those in the know

We’re experiencing another rash of Uncle Bunny setbacks. So send vibes, thoughts, whatevs you gots his direction. I wouldn’t mind if you sent some to my family as well, as that situation deteriorated as well.

Oh My Freakin’ God

That Duggar woman is having her 18th child.
Lady, it’s a VAGINA not a clown car.

It’s nice to be heard, and thank you

Did I call for divine intervention? Was it granted? Yes and yes.
Opened up shop on the computer this am only to find that due to a water main break there is no school today! Whoot!

AND I had just finished up all my homework, so other than reviewing for exams for next week and a little light sci-fi reading for Monday I’m cool on all that. Paid all the bills and got the paperwork dealt with which is a major anxiety weight off my shoulders. As well as that while I may be technically broke, what money there is, is mine all mine.

Think I’ll go wrap the wedding present that has been hanging fire, getting that out of the way while it’s early, then actually get the dining room table cleared of all the nagging that had been.

Now we gotta think of something cool to do. I’m for going to the water of some kind. Down to the river or something.

So, later skaters, I’m off to do some stuff to make my life work.

I changed my mind...

I do have something cheery to say, and that is, that I’m so proud and excited for my three friends, Karl LaFong, F. Rhetoric, and Cheddar, some of whom were really down in the pit swimmin’ with the darkest of angels when they decided to get into the prickly embrace of sobriety. Between the three of them they have over six years in. As expected they all turned out to be bright, sincere, sweet, sensitive people. And a couple of them, hilariously irascible.

So this is how it’s just gonna be...

So tired, the store job kicks my ass. When I first started it kicked my ass also. Then I started getting stronger and stronger. I got some decent shoes. I started getting some muscles and stamina. I did better and better as the years went by. Then I had a couple surgeries the first of of which went kinda wrong, the next of which went really wrong. The horribly expensive shoes wore out. Now if I do a four hour shift I have to sleep 3 hours.

On Mondays, cuz I’m a homework slacker, I get off work then play drums until I’m really, really tired and usually quite frustrated. Then go to drum class. Then I can crash for awhile. While I tell myself its for just a quick, rejuvenating nap it invariably turns into a long stupefying nap, then I spend the rest of the day being a schlub.

This last month adds to the stultifying mix, extreme tension in my home life. The result is the house is dirty, the energy levels are all fucked up, and it doesn’t seem worth it to get up and do a damn thing. However something has to change the energy, I can no longer sit and stew. (I am so good at stewing, I meant what I said about grudge holding.)

So while I didn’t go about solving the problem the super high road way, I also didn’t take the lowliest low road. I, at least, addressed an individual face to face for the 15 seconds requisite and decided to skip the “preserve the friendship” part. I got some support for that approach from a few people who said if I didn’t want the friendship to just go ahead and remove the pain source.
Done.
Its not like I had zero interest in the friendship, but when alcoholism is the factor, what’s the point?
This is something like the 10th friendship of some significance that has terminated in the last 10 years or so, where I trace the real source of the problem to addiction. Not mine, someone else's. If we went back farther in time, the numbers would grow exponentially.

It’s just getting so very old. But when there is little or no return for your energy, so little actual dialogue, just boozy, stale monologues repeated over and over while someone breathes alcohol in your face what's left anyway? It won’t change until it changes and that's nothing you can control at all, so rather be done.

This whole giving your whole life to a THING is freaking me out. You just hand over everything you are, could be and will do, to an inanimate object. What the hell is that? I’m not saying I haven’t had my skirmishes with such slavery, but I seem to have a finely tuned sense of personal freedom. When a stupid thing starts requiring my very core self and values, I turn and run. I don’t care how much fun it’s promising. I don’t care if its a substance or a job or a relationship.

The other part that's bugging me, is the age of these people. I can see how in your twenties you haven’t figured it out yet, but the people involved are in their thirties, forties and fifties. One of them had already done over 20 years in prison as payment and just took another twenty to pay for just a couple months of getting high. Yet it’s his primary relationship and he’ll apparently never, ever, put anyone or anything ahead of it. It, an inanimate object, a thing.

I can’t think of a goofy, cheery, twist to end this on, everything about this is so annoying. I suppose the the best I can do is mention that at least I’m mostly over the furious and into the sad.