Year

It was a year ago today that my cousin died in a car accident.

Just now, as I sit here in my living room, empty house, stars out, I heard a bird singing. That wasn't my imagination. That was simply the way she appears to me. She's flashes of light in the corner of my eye and a soothing voice in my head and birds singing at night.

A lot has happened to me in the last year. Life has continued on for the rest of us, ticking away. I've been through falling in love and breaking up and falling in love again. I've moved away from home and returned like the prodigal son. I've experienced surplus and been a victim of the economic downturn. It's been an incredible roller coaster.

The pain I've felt over this death has been constant. I can't talk about that day without tearing up, without feeling the same sense of unnecessary, unfair, unkind loss that I felt the day it happened. She gave so much to the world that I can't say her life was wasted. Her death was. What should have been the rest of her life was wasted on death. I can't help but feel that she would have accomplished so much more had she been allowed to live.

It cuts the worst to know the way I've been living. That someone so beautiful was lost to the world while I continue to live and make terrible decisions is mind boggling. Her final lesson to us is in the choices we choose to make. I have to choose to live in a way that honors her, that carries on the things she showed everyone she came in contact with.

She gave. She gave all that she was to everyone she knew. She didn't save it up for those she liked best, or those who gave to her first. She gave all the love and life she had at every opportunity. She didn't hesitate. It's why she was everyone's best friend, why seven hundred and fifty people showed up at her funeral. It's why even someone like me, someone who didn't know her well, who wasn't particularly close to her, feels her death as strongly as ever one year later.

She gave of herself. In the end, I suppose she had just given it all away in her sixteen years and all that was left was for her to go.

Memories

I didn't stand up and share any memories of my cousin at her funeral, but I know what I would have said.

I used to see her at work. I work for her school district as a custodian, and I would sometimes find myself at the high school. Sometimes I would watch her at cheerleading practice in the commons. Sometimes I'd see her walking down the halls with a friend of hers. Once, I caught her hobbling out of a classroom on crutches, having stayed late to study for a French test. She hobbled on crutches a lot, once she got into high school. I may not have seen her very often at school (or otherwise, I'll admit), but half the times I did see her, she was busted up in one way or another.

I always said hello, and we would chat for a little bit. I'd ask her how school was going, or how she hurt herself, and then I'd tell her not to make any messes on her way out. I always found myself proud to see her, wanting to tell people about it. I would turn to my co-workers and say, "That's my cousin," smiling. And whenever she walked away from me, I would hear her say the same thing to her friends.

Maybe it doesn't sound that important. We are cousins, after all, and there's not much point in denying it if we're going to have conversations in the hallway. But I always felt like there are a lot of kids out there who wouldn't want their friends knowing that they were related to the janitor, kids who might be embarrassed or ashamed. And she never was. She sounded every bit as proud to claim me as her cousin as I was to claim her, and I won't ever forget that.

She's also one of the few people who's beaten me at Disney Trivial Pursuit, and I don't think I'll forget that, either.

Sharing without Hearing

I was talking with a co-worker earlier today and the subject came up. It started with talk of songs. She had a particular song that always made her sad because it reminded her of someone she knew who had died. I understood. So many songs remind me of my cousin. It's often hard to escape. I told her as much.

She asked me if my cousin and I were close, and I answered honestly. No, we were not. I started to explain that my family all cared very much about each other, but that we are a large family and it's difficult to be close to everyone. I wanted to explain that it hadn't mattered that I wasn't close to my cousin, that it still struck me harder than I would have expected, that I still grieved and continue to grieve. I wanted her to know that death is impacting, and that I had been impacted.

But she walked away. As though the death meant little if I hadn't been close to the person who had died. As though, "No, we weren't close," was all there was to that story.

It's always been a concern of mine, how deeply I've felt the loss of my cousin. In many ways, I don't feel entitled to it. So many times I feel as though my grief is detracting from the people who are truly in pain, from the people who have felt the loss of someone who made their lives, who warmed them and loved them and was a part of them. I often feel that the extent of my grief is unjustified, which is why I don't really like to talk about it.

I've kept these writings a secret from anyone who knows me. I refuse to create a situation where someone who's hurting worse than I am feels that I'm attempting to gain something here. I don't want any of my family or any of her friends thinking that I only want attention or that I'm being overly dramatic about this trauma for my own purposes. I don't want to open up about how badly I've been hurt by this chain of events only to have someone else confirm that I'm only trying to steal the spotlight.

Which is sort of how I felt when my co-worker walked away from me. "Oh, you weren't close? Okay, I'll move on to a more important conversation then ... "

This was a Good day

I saw flashes of light today. While I was at work, I kept seeing little sparkles of light to my right, that would disappear as soon as I tried to look at them. I could try to explain it away as something strange with the lighting, or glitter on my cheek or any number of other perfectly logical explanations.

But I sat down today and I started writing the story, Her Story, and it has never come easier to me. I'm afraid to jinx it now, and hit another wall, but I feel like she was there, cheering me on and sharing her story with me. I feel like she was giving me answers.

I've felt so good today.

Writing Fiction From Fact

I have this story that I've been wanting to write. It's the story of my cousin's last moments. Just before her truck swerves, she and her passenger are pulled out of the truck and taken to a myriad of places, talking with two angels about their future plans, their families, their relationship with each other before it's revealed to them that one of them will die. As the driver, it is up to my cousin to take the knowledge that she has just gleaned and make the decision. Turning the wheel an inch or two one way or the other determines where the truck will hit the tree. It determines who takes the most impact. It determines who gets to survive the coming accident. When they're back in the car, without knowing why, she turns the wheel the tiniest bit to the right, sparing her friend and sacrificing herself. And there's a moment, before the collision, when she remembers the time with the angels, remembers her decision, and smiles just a little.

I don't know how many times I've opened the document to try and write this story. I must have started it twenty times. I can't seem to get it quite right, and I can't seem to move forward with it until I do. I'm stuck somewhere at the beginning without being able to move on. Is there a metaphor in that somewhere?

I don't know why I feel the urge to write this story. I don't know why I feel like I need it so badly. And maybe I'm still too close to it, too close to the tragedy and the pain to be able to voice the peace that this story contains. I don't know. But it's the most frustrating case of writer's block I've ever had.

Seraph

A strange thing has happened since my cousin died.

I've mentioned before that she and I were not particularly close. We have a very large family (our parents make up a part of six children, all of whom have children of their own, half of which have been divorced and remarried to someone who previously had children, so there's upwards of fifty of us). We always see the family on the holidays, and certain other special occasions. Sometimes, it's just a barbecue in the summertime, but we see each other. We visit. We know the basics about each other -- this one plays football, that one's a cheerleader, those two are musicians, etc. And since we've been around each other for all our lives, we can easily have conversations and be around each other.

That does not guarantee a closeness. I've learned more about my cousin since she died than I ever knew about her while she lived. This makes me sad. More than sad. It makes me regretful, which is something that I rarely am. And perhaps that explains the strange thing.

Over the last couple of months, my cousin has turned into a guiding star for me. When I'm upset, or I feel lost, or I just can't handle the stress of the life I'm living, I find myself turning to her. I turn to her, in my mind, and I say, "What am I supposed to do now?" I ask her for her guidance and I try to take the knowledge that I have of her and figure out what she would say to me. A lot of times, when I feel myself breaking, I'll see a picture of her. It's rarely the same picture, it's always at a random moment, but something in that photo gives me the answer I'm looking for. Something shining in that still of her face says, "Don't give up on your dreams," or, "Smile," or, "Just give 'em some attitude," and it's always exactly right.

I feel that this is purposeful. I feel that it's intentional. I feel that this is a gift given to me from her, from the world. It doesn't feel odd and it doesn't feel selfish. It feels right that she would be the one to lead me to the right path, that she would help become the person that I long to be. When I need a hand to hold, it seems like she's right there holding it. Maybe it doesn't sound right, maybe it sounds like I'm glad she's dead, but I'm so thankful to have her beside me. I'm so incredibly thankful to not have to feel completely alone.

I know she made people feel like that when she was alive. I know that everyone who was close to her felt that she did that for them. And I just hate that I couldn't have had her living comfort, too.

I hope that the rest of them know she's there. I hope that they feel her, holding their hands when they're lost, touching their shoulders when they cry. Because I know they're lost. And I know they cry. And I know she's there for them.

Tomorrow

I think what I hate the most right now is that I didn't realize how important she was while she was alive. I had no idea that she meant this much, that it would hurt so badly that she was gone. And even though this tragedy has brought so many of us together, it makes me wonder. It makes me wonder how many others there are -- how many other people do I take for granted? How many others in my life would I miss this much? Or more? How many times a day do I say, "Next time ..."

The last time I saw her, I said, "Next time, we'll actually get to talk," as I walked out the door after only a quick hello. How often does that happen? And how many people have been taught such a difficult lesson? That sometimes, there isn't a next time. Sometimes, what we're left with today is all that we're left with.

And I just ... I just never could have seen this coming.