legacy

I went back and looked at some of Zach’s journal entries the other day. They resonate differently from how they felt six months ago. Am I changing or is the memory of Zach the flesh and blood person dimming? Maybe it was just that particular entry that struck me differently.

More generally, it started me thinking about how we are remembered. Once there were paintings, then photographs and now videos for images but throughout it all there has been writing. And writing, unlike images, requires the person to take active steps to create those memories. (We’ll set aside self portraits for now.)

I had reached out to my nephew Steve the other day about his blog that I remembered but didn’t have saved anywhere. He got back to me with the link and said he still went back and read it to see what kind of person he was then. Well, I think it’s too bad he’s not keeping it up, but that’s not the point. We write to be remembered – by ourselves and by others. Steve hasn’t taken the blog down. I spent a few minutes looking through some of the last entries. He’s moved on to other things I suppose. (Actually he’s a brilliant videographer. See his website at http://thedigitalagent.com/)

I’ve written a lot over the years. I generally have written more when I travel than when I’m at home so I’ve got lots of good records of that. When the kids were little I kept journals of their doings. Some of my more recent musings have been on the computer. Will the paper or the electron last longer? My bet is on the electron although there are issues with that as well.

I know I’d sure like it if my grandfather had written more. My mother has a couple of things he wrote but it’s only tantalizing. I can remember him but what about when I’m gone? A few fading photos like some others that I have. They’re of families – ancestors – but I don’t know who they are.

To be continued . . .

Here’s Steve’s blog address (last entry 2010!): http://backseatmusings.blogspot.com/

Jeremy

This blog isn’t really about Zach even though lately he’s been the top topic and his picture is on the front page. As it says on the front page, this blog is about understanding myself. It’s a way to make me write things that are on my mind. It’s been helpful to me to get this stuff out. I would like to generate dialog with others but that has been slow to develop. Hello, reader! Does my writing make you want to respond? Please do!

So, Jeremy. Jeremy started a blog many years ago. I think he was living in Montana then. He wrote something that his mother took exception to and he was upset. He was just being open with his feelings. I remember counseling him that he always needed to remember who his audience was. The subtext there was that if she might read it, then he needed to take that into account when writing. I think the experience took the wind out of his sails and I don’t believe the blog is extant.

Anyway, Jeremy’s birthday is coming up and I sat down this morning with a card to write something to my son. So many things came into my mind that I sat there for several minutes before writing anything. In the end, I wrote something brief and light for the card but I want to go a little longer and deeper here.

When I was a teenager, I railed against my father for his ‘perfect’ life. He went to college, got a job, got married, had kids, bought a house in suburbia … you get the idea. Despite (or perhaps because of) my own wanderings, this model seems to be lodged in my consciousness as an ideal. Jeremy hasn’t followed that path either. He’s done all those things but in a less orderly fashion.

Perhaps that says more about the changing times than it does anything else. Now he and Ashley are plotting to move across the country in an attempt to improve their living situation. How can you not admire that grand vision and steadfast purpose? In the face of unspeakable tragedy, Jeremy showed a grace and maturity that sometimes surprised me. That says more about me than anything else.It’s hard to let go of the idea that your child is in need of your wisdom. Jeremy has plenty of his own, hard-won, wisdom.

So Jeremy I just want to say how proud I am of you and what you’ve accomplished. From your doddering, sentimental dad.

killed

Killed. I haven’t looked it up in the dictionary. I’m pretty sure I know what it means. It’s a brutal word. It’s the word I use to describe what happened to Zach. He didn’t ‘die’, he didn’t ‘pass away’, he was killed.

We say he was killed instantly when he was hit by the pickup truck but in reality we don’t really know. The front right corner of the truck hit him while he was on his bike and he rolled up and hit the window. Julie says she saw him flying through the air so I guess that’s what happened next. When he hit the ground the right front wheel of the truck ran him over. I’d like to believe he was dead before that happened. The police say he was at fault for not yielding to oncoming traffic. They say he was drunk and therefore responsible. The driver, who was going 53 mph (estimated) in a 35 zone, got a speeding ticket.

I’ve seen the police pictures – some of them. When I got to the one that showed his broken face I started screaming and ran to my bed and assumed the fetal position. My neighbor Rose heard the noise and came over and just held me while I sobbed. Of course I can still see that image in my mind’s eye.

Killed.

reaction

It’s interesting to read the generally upbeat tone of the last post from the perspective of a few days later. I had left the larger group to their activities and went off by myself, first (after breakfast) heading over to Zephyr Point where Nancy had had the bench installed. I suppose I was technically trespassing as I was not a guest there. No one challenged me and I did not stay long. I was well familiar with the conference center layout and went right to it.

It’s a lovely spot and a lovely bench. The day was the best that Tahoe could offer:

I drove on up the east side to Incline Village, got some lunch and headed down the hill to the Kents in Grass Valley, where I spent a good couple of hours just talking. Then to my brother Tom’s, where the foothill Woods were gathering.

That was very nice. I especially enjoyed watching the cousins play together. We stayed the night at Tom’s and got up early the next day to have breakfast with our former neighbor Patsy. Originally I wasn’t going to go since Nancy was going to be there and I didn’t want to harsh anyone’s buzz. The children prevailed upon me and in the end it was fine. We were both on our best behavior. After breakfast, Emily & Linda loaded their stuff in my car and I took them back to SF to fly home.

All that went well. I felt pretty normal most of the time; no big weepies or anything. I knew I was going to need a nap when I got home. Both nights away had been really short. So the three hour nap Sunday afternoon didn’t surprise me but going to bed again at 8:30 and sleeping to 6 am did. Then Monday morning after I did laundry, I was really tired again and had to lay down some more. I had driven 625 miles by myself from Friday at noon to Sunday at noon with a total of 8 hours sleep.

Jeremy was coming back from Grass Valley and Teresa had a big dinner planned but I was logy the whole afternoon. Finally after they called to say they were there at Teresa’s, I walked over without enthusiasm.

Before I even got in the front door, I was hit with a 3 1/2 year old lightning bolt named Rosalie who doesn’t do sadness. So that was good. We had a wonderful evening. Rosalie wanted to go to the beach and Ashley wanted to go to the pier to look for whales again. Luckily, there is beach near the pier. The whales were still putting on a show and Rosalie played in the sand and watched the birds and fisherfolk. Then we came back and ate and visited some more.

The next morning we saw the Georgia folks off to the airport from Teresa’s. Jane took them in her van. We got one last photo then I headed home for more laundry and cleaning up. Nancy had wanted the oak box that held Zach’s ashes for these last few months so it was gone.

I put Hobbes in my bedroom next to Poochie and took the dead flowers out to Rose’s little Zach garden and laid them there.

I don’t feel sadness so much as I’m just really tired. I’m going back to work today so we’ll see how that goes. I had agreed to work on Friday which would have made four straight long days working. The thought of that was making me weak so I bailed out of that one. Hopefully I can keep it together for today and tomorrow and recover on Friday.

dawn over Emerald Bay

I made it to the spot where Eagle Creek flows under the road and leaps over the cliff about a minute before local dawn on Saturday. I took a picture that is crappy but it shows the sun just peeping over the mountains on the east side of the lake.

One person was already there: a real photographer with his camera on a tripos capturing the serene scene. We said hello to each other but otherwise went about our own business. It was a few minutes before 6. The rest of our group wasn’t due until 7 so I just looked around a bit & drank in the silence and beauty and snapped a couple of photos of my own. A couple of kayakers were out on the bay. (Those two little dots are kayakers.)

Presently a large van pulled up and disgorged about a dozen teenagers who came down to where I was and started hooting and hollering and throwing rocks and things. I went back up to the road. I hoped they would get tired before Jeremy got there & luckily by that time they were just leaving. Another group came and went so when Nancy & Linda arrived about 10 til we were completely alone. Sarah then picked up the bag with the jars and we all went down the steps to the creek and falls. We each selected a jar and went to commune with Zach’s remains one last time.

I had somehow gotten the idea that the ashes would float at least a little so I went to the pool and tipped a little in. To my horror, the ashes didn’t float at all. They went straight to the bottom of that lovely pool and made a big gray stain on the rocks under the still water. Of course I could feel Zach laughing at me for my foolishness.

So then I went to the end of the pool where the water starts to rush over the rocks preparatory to going over the falls and put a little more in. This time the bulk of the ash was swept away immediately but there were little solid bits (bone?) that caught in the crevices in the rocks and stared back at me as if to say, ‘Now what, big boy?’

I picked the frothiest part of the rapids where the bottom couldn’t be seen and poured all the rest in. It’s like jumping off the cliff, I said to Zach. All at once or not at all.

Sarah came over and helped me sweep the worst of the stain into the running water but the little bits in the crevices were obstinate so we let them be.

whales

Jeremy, Ashley, Rosalie & Emily all arrived safely in the Bay Area yesterday and we had a lovely day. At this moment, they are in Santa Clara preparing for their drive to Lake Tahoe.

That’s the short version. Now for a longer version.

Sarah came and stayed with me Wednesday night. Jeremy’s family arrived at SFO about 9:30 and Sarah went to pick them up. They got to the apartment & had been there less than 15 minutes when I got the text from Emily that she had landed. Ashley went with me to pick her up at the airport. It was Emily’s first time in California. The San Francisco fog was doing its summer thing: sunny and warm, if a little breezy, at the airport, cool and cloudy at the coast. I was amused to see all the Easterners in T-shirts and shorts. They were amused to see me in my long-sleeved shirt and jeans.

After some lunch, we headed out to Devil’s Slide trail and Zach’s rock. We were joined there by Teresa and Paul, and Joe and the boys. Jane was already in Santa Clara preparing.

It developed that Zach’s rock was less interesting than whales. What I hadn’t realized was that Joe had guaranteed Ashley a whale sighting and she was determined to hold him to it. Although we could see a couple of whale watching boats not far offshore, we saw no whale activity.

After 20 minutes or so of that, Joe got in his car and went down to Half Moon Bay where he spotted some and called us. There we hit the jackpot. First it was just seeing the back of the whale coming up for air but then suddenly one came charging up out of the water with its mouth wide open all only about 100 yards from where we were standing. Jeremy described Ashley as ‘like a 12 year old at a Justin Bieber concert.’ I have to admit it was spectacular. Joe said they were California Grays.

In the course of about 45 minutes of watching, we saw the breaching several more times. I was not quick or lucky enough to get a good picture. This picture gives you an idea of how close they were. About where the guy on the paddle board is.

After that, everyone headed down to Santa Clara to Mom & Dad’s. Rosalie went over to the park and played in the sand with Sarah.

Jane’s visit

My sister Jane had been saying for some weeks that she wanted to visit Zach at my house before we all took his ashes away. I called her yesterday morning to remind her that time was getting short and she was able to stop by later in the day.

Earlier, I had offered up several options for her visit, thinking that she would want private time but in the event she and I just talked. We didn’t talk a lot about Zach per se, as one might at a wake, but more about our reactions to his death and the arc of our griefs. She cried a little but I was strangely calm. I was able to talk about how I had cried so much in the early days and then as time passed I cried less but then I felt that not crying was to somehow invalidate the grief. I’ve learned that grief has no time line nor is there any formula for it. When I’ve cried recently it has been triggered by some random thing not directly related to Zach. I told her about the Bereavement Support Group I have been going to and said that it was open to her as well if she wanted.

We talked about souls and what they might be really. What is the difference between a living person and his earthly remains, be it a body or a box full of ashes or a headstone somewhere? My contention is that the things that Zach touched and were part of his life – his clothes, his books, his computer, his phone, etc. – are just as much Zach as his ashes. His ‘soul’ is his memory within those who are still living and all of those things contribute to his memory.

Jane saw a picture I had of our beloved Uncle Bob who died in 1999. She commented that there really were very few family members who had died in her adult lifetime and she didn’t know how to react. We’ve had Aunts & Uncles die in the last 10 years ago but they were in other states and we weren’t close. None of us kids went to the funerals. Our grandparents have been dead for more than 20 years and they all lived far away. I remember thinking something similar years ago: that I’ve lived a charmed life and no one really close to me has died. It’s not really true; I’ve lost colleagues, some to age, some to suicide, some to AIDS, but no one I was really close to personally. I’ve been to some funerals now.

Here’s the picture of Uncle Bob with Teresa:

Teresa and Uncle Bob

Zach’s ashes

Zach’s ashes have been at my house since I came back from Louisiana. They rest on a table in my living room. I’ve placed his Hobbes doll next to him along with the Rubik’s Cube that he was so good at. One of the flower arrangements that came in December dried out kind of nicely so I’ve kept it there too.

Here’s a photo:

Next week it will all change. Sarah is coming Wednesday night & we will take the ashes and distribute them into 6 small Mason jars. These we will carry with us up to Lake Tahoe where on Saturday morning we will each – 6 of us now – take a jar and place his remains back into the earth there.

After months of avoidance, everyone is finally talking seriously about the little details of this event. I expect to have a post about it next week. Here’s a picture I took back in March of the spot we will most likely be at: Eagle Creek Falls just above Emerald Bay.

IMG_7881 cropped

Noah

The Laura Nyro song ‘And When I Die’ came up on my rotation the other day. Her version is so poignant because she died before her time. (I thought she was younger, but she was almost 50 when she died in 1997.)

For some reason I thought of Ally and Noah when I heard it. I was driving and my first thought was to send it to her but later I thought it might be more appropriate here. Noah’s last name will never appear in this forum so all I will say is that he is Zach’s natural child, Ally is the mother – a remarkable woman – and he now has the last name of his Dad, Ally’s husband and a remarkable man. Zach cooperated with Noah’s adoption by them in 2014.

Zach had not told anyone in his family of Noah’s existence for reasons that I can only speculate on. His discovery by us is a story for another time. As you might imagine, it was quite a shock coming only a few days after the shock of Zach’s death. It was only due to Ally’s quiet determination for Noah to know his blood relatives that I was able to finally come to accept the fact – as quite a few people said to me -that we have a little part of Zach still on this earth.

Which brings me to the lyric that hit me between the eyes: ‘And when I die, And when I’m dead and gone, There’ll be one child born, And a world to carry on, carry on.’

I met Noah at a celebration a week after Zach died but I was so wrecked I wasn’t very coherent. After some weeks passed, I was able to write him a letter (on paper, and put in the mail!) and we have developed a relationship that way. Someday I will meet him in person again.

Here’s the whole lyric, copied from Laura Nyro’s web site http://www.lauranyro.com/

I’m not scared of dyin’
And I don’t really care
If it’s peace you find in dyin’
Well then let the time be near
Just bundle up my coffin
‘Cause its cold way down there
And when I die
And when I’m gone
There’ll be one child born
And a world to carry on

My troubles are many
They’re deep as a well
I swear there ain’t no heaven
And I pray there ain’t no hell
But I’ll never know by livin’
Only my dyin’ will tell
And when I die
And when I’m gone
There’ll be one child born
And a world to carry on

Give me my freedom
For as long as I be
All I ask of livin’
Is to have no chains on me
All I ask of livin’
Is to have no chains on me
And all I ask of dyin’
Is to go naturally
And when I die
And when I’m gone
There’ll be one child born
And a world to carry on

Cubby’s grief; my grief

I called Cubby today & talked to him on the phone. I’ve been trying to work up the courage to do that ever since his wife died on Easter Sunday morning. I sent him a text that morning but every time since when I thought I had a few minutes to call him I found a way to not do it.

I called him earlier in the year when Ronata took a turn for the worse. I had to leave a message and I almost couldn’t get any coherent words out. He’d been struggling with her being seriously ill since her stroke in 2010 & the thought of another death close to me knotted me up completely.

Cubby told me he had to quit his job at the union because he was basically going crazy. He had thought it would be better for him to go back to work but it wasn’t. Now he’s on partial disability while he tries to make sense of his life. He’s in therapy as I am. I told him about the Bereavement Support Group that Kaiser sponsors that has been very helpful to me. He said he would check out their East Bay schedule.

For those who don’t know, the night Zach was killed I was mixing audio for a show at the Herbst and had turned my phone off. Jeremy was frantically trying to reach me and all he could think of was that he had Cubby’s phone number from 3 1/2 years ago when he came out to work out of the hall for a couple of weeks during the busy season. Cubby called Stacey, who was stage managing that night & got her to have me turn my phone on. Cubby told me to call Jeremy immediately. I knew it was bad but I thought something had happened to Rosalie. Never in a million years would I have guessed what actually did happen.

After I talked to Jeremy and started putting the show stuff in order so I could leave – in a daze, thank you Stacey & Smitty – I talked to Cubby again about some other jobs I had scheduled for the next two days.. He told me very forcefully that I needed to get with my family and not worry – indeed, not to even think about – any work issues. He said over and over, ‘Whatever you need, I’ll be there for you.’ And I knew he wasn’t bullshitting because he doesn’t bullshit. He stuck with me on the phone as I was driving to Teresa’s.

So we’re talking today about grief and how it manifests – mostly crying jags. I told him I had been pretty good for several weeks but yesterday out of nowhere I started sobbing and couldn’t stop for about ten minutes. He said yeah that’s weird, the same thing happened to him about the same time.

There’s a lot more to the story of that awful night but for now all I want to do is say I talked to Cubby today & I didn’t start bawling. I guess that’s good.

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