Spring and the Wu Wei Moon
Shabbat gratefuls: Kate, always Kate. Her yahrzeit. Passover. Talmud Torah. Tara. Arjan. Eleanor. Leo. Findlay. Gracie. Annie and Luna. A Mountain Morning. Pagans. Planting festivals. Beltane. Greenhouse. The Night Sky. Shadow. A perfect night. Paul’s procedure. Dad’s birthday.
Sparks of Joy and Awe: Passover
Week Kavannah: Wu Wei
One brief shining: Kate had the b-pap on, negative pressure to get air in the lungs, hated it; not long after she asked me if I would rather have her dead or disabled, not long after that she decided to die.
Of course I told her I wanted her alive between those two choices. When she decided to die, she asked what I thought of her decision. I hate it, because I’ll lose you; but, I think it’s the right decision for you.
She had a clarity of thought, an unflinching nature in the face of trouble. If there was ever an emergency at work, she got called to go with the crash cart. We both knew the struggle had gotten near the end.
We cried. I asked her about some of her last wishes. Jewelry to Jeremiah, the painter and brother-in-law. Expand the Iris bed on Shadow Mountain. Plant lilacs. Then to me: Zip up. And trust your doctors.
Her doctor came in and said she understood Kate wished to “transition.” Die is not in the vocabulary of the physician. Kate said yes. Her life supports, including the b-pap machine were removed. Morphine sufficient to stave off the fear generated by air hunger dripped from her IV.
I left. The doctors said it would take a day or two for her to die. I had Rigel and Kepler to take care of back home. After driving me home, Rich asked me if I wanted to go back. No, I said.
At that point I had to feed and get water for Rigel and Kepler. The last ten days had been constant travel between Shadow Mountain and Swedish Hospital down the hill in Englewood. Emotional and physical exhaustion had taken a toll on me, too.
She died that night. I regret not being there. I also regret that when I saw her corpse it frightened me so I could not go to her. Over the years since I’ve made my peace with those regrets. I can’t change them and Kate, I know, would have understood.
This is the first time I’ve written about these last things. The regrets. I do it now because we make such a fetish of hiding the reality of death. I don’t want to be part of that. It was hard, painful for her and for me. For many others, too.
Later on, a couple of years following her death, I took her remains, housed in a Richard Bresnahan clay jar, and spread them out on a small, unnamed Mountain Stream that feeds into Maxwell Creek, then Bear Creek, then the South Platter River, carrying her down to the Gulf of Mexico and the World Ocean.