Weeping Wailers

Forces have been conspiring lately. What forces, I am still not sure. I blame my writing hand, facebook's addition to constantly updating the layout (have you nothing else to do with your time web programers?), and well, life, for reminding me of death. And my reminding I mean "parading around before me."

I re-read old diary entries before writing the finishing line, which led my wandering mind (and heart) to the old photos storied on my laptop, protected against the harsh garage world of time and dust in which my desk-top now finds itself. And I stumbled upon warm reminders of someone I loved.

I lost a friend my first year of university. She was beautiful. She had this dry, self-deprecating sense of humor that was matched only by her deep honest laugh. Despite the 2000 miles between us we forged a friendship based on laughter, ridiculous notions and sometimes mindless chatter that, in some ways, keep my spinning life grounded during the hardest year of my life.

Lupus stole her hair and then her kidneys and eventually her life, all before her 22nd birthday.

And then this week, following the journal's end and these retrieved memories, the world wide web decided to play a somewhat sick joke:

I spent the Tuesday after my university graduation dressed in black, placing three scoops of dirt of the coffin of a high school friend. She fought a valiant battle with Leukemia, and then, with all the grace in the world, accepted that her body, despite its young 22 years, had betrayed her.

And, days after the funeral, I went to Europe. And then I moved to India and put it in a box.

But the past six times I have logged onto facebook the box reappeared, right there on the top right hand of the screen, reminding me to "reconnect." So, after silently using some select language with facebook, I acquiesced by visiting her page.

A mutual friend had beat me to it:

"Hey Girl,

Facebook, in a cruel twist of irony, keeps telling me to write on your wall. So, here I am. Hope wherever you are is treating you well.

P.S. And if facebook is pestering you to write on my wall -- don't worry about it."

Then today I found my way into a funeral. The elderly man across the lane passed away, and the village has, respectfully, fallen silent. We visited this morning to pay our respects, sat with women and watched as people entered and made their way to the bed where his body lay, uncovered his face, and then wailed.

There was no silent weeping. Instead the women's shoulders shock with the burden of their mourning, the sounds pouring from their mouths reflecting the aching of their hearts.

We do not mourn like that at home. At the four funerals I have attended the families sat, crest-fallen, but attempting to mask the burden of their breaking worlds in some feeble attempt at strength and dignity. As if a breaking heart signifies weakness. As though mourning is to be done privately. As if breaking means being broken.

As if, when the axis around which your universe spins is stolen from you, there is some shame in your heart's spinning out of control.

It seemed fitting that, as loved ones looked upon this man's face for the last time, as they watched fire engulf the blankets cocooning his body, wails rose with flames.

It seemed fitting that, concurrently, they let his body and their sadness go.