death

I have a confession. I like murder mysteries. A lot. Call them what you will: police procedurals, cozy mysteries, whodunits, even thrillers. The death is not the important part; it’s a catalyst for the puzzle. The hook is the chase and the solution.

It occurred to me this week – given that I have extra time on my hands for murder mysteries – that these stories and puzzles almost completely ignore the grieving process. People get back to the office (and have to work even though there was a murder!) and the family and friends of the victim help (or hinder) the investigation. It all feels very non-Jewish.

When a Jew dies, the immediate family stops everything for 7 days and allows themselves the space to mourn and remember. Semi-mourning goes on for 30 days. And then the person is remembered on their death anniversary every year.

I had forgotten that there are other days in the year when a candle is lit and a prayer said in remembrance of those, especially parents, no longer with us: Yizkor, from the Hebrew root of the verb “to remember.”

Synchronicity

This week I’ve been listening to an audiobook about an 82-year-old Jewish man living with his granddaughter in Oslo. He has lots of opinions, doesn’t pay much attention to what other people think, and kind-of lives in the past. Some of his monologues reminded me of my dad.

Christoper Lloyd was the guest star on this week’s episode of NCIS. I can’t put my finger on why exactly but he always reminds me of my dad. Something in the cheekbones? Maybe some of the kooky behavior of his characters? His character in this episode was a curmudgeonly WWII vet who just wanted his story to be heard and to have his ashes interred on the USS Arizona, the ship that sank in the bombing of Pearl Harbor. The last scenes of the episode show divers taking the ashes down to the sunken ship.

Before the coronavirus shutdown, I was planning to take some of my dad’s ashes to Masada, but everything – and I mean everything! – conspired against it. A friend offered to drive me to Masada and we had to cancel a couple of times for various reasons. And then when our schedules matched, a huge storm blew in with high-speed winds and flooding. Two days later, everything was closed because of coronavirus.

My Google calendar reminded me that Thursday was Yizkor and, coincidentally, I got an email from Chabad about the prayer said on these special days. So I lit a candle for Dad and said a prayer of remembrance. After all this, Dad will have to let me know when and where he wants his ashes interred.

Pass Over

Some rabbis have noted that Passover is a very unusual time to be locked in our homes avoiding the coronavirus. The tenth plague was the killing of the firstborn. And the Angel of Death passed over the homes marked with the blood of sacrifice. The Hebrews were released from Egypt and in freedom on the the other side of the Red Sea became a nation.

All of us will be released from our homes eventually. And we will have lost people to the virus and to death from other causes. Unlike in a murder mystery, we will grieve, we will mourn, and most importantly, we will remember.

Image by Jill Wellington from Pixabay

Nobody likes to talk about death. There are so many euphemisms for death just so that we don’t have to say it. Transitional: passed away, passed on, crossed over, went to the great beyond, no longer with us. Scientific: expired (like milk?), deceased. Fated: taken, number came up. Weird: kicked the bucket, bought the farm. Yesterday, my dad cashed in his chips.

It might be a little scary to think of Death coming as a Grim Reaper to gather your soul. So scary that maybe immortality is better (and so say many, many TV shows and movies, especially vampire ones).

In the Tarot deck, Death seems like it would be the scariest card. It’s Death! But it is actually the one with the most potential. Death means change. One thing passes on to make room for another. The loss is sad, but there needs to be room for something new to come into your life.

The truth is that while I like all the euphemisms – mostly because I like to play with language – I don’t think that death has to be feared. It will happen to all of us.

Here in Israel, there are also many euphemisms for death. Niftar comes from the root meaning “to be released.” Halach l’olamo means “went to his world,” which, all things considered, sounds very pleasant. There is talk of an olam ha’bah, “the next world.”

When my grandmother “went to her world” I was 8 years old and didn’t quite understand why she left her cane. Hysterical, I shrieked, “How is she going to walk around without it?!?!” Dad told me that where she was she didn’t need it anymore. She was young and healthy and having a picnic in the shade of a tree with Grampa Brown, who was also healthy and young. The tree was by a small stream. It was a sunny, warm, pleasant day and they were happy.

In order to get to this other world, you have to go through a door. That door is death. We don’t really know what is on the other side of the door. We are asked to have faith that when our souls leave the body they’ve inhabited on this earth, our pure souls, the sparks of light that we are, will go on to something else, something better, something our material minds cannot even begin to comprehend.

Of the things you say to a mourner, my favorite is yehi zichro baruch, sometimes said as zichrono livracha, which means “may his memory be a blessing.” To me it means that every time you remember the dearly departed, there is a blessing that comes with it. I like less baruch dayan ha’emet, which means “blessed is the true judge.” That more or less suggests that God works in mysterious ways and we praise God even in sorrow.

Dad wasn’t an Eric Clapton fan, but “Tears in Heaven” seems appropriate.

Beyond the door
There’s peace I’m sure
And I know there’ll be no more
Tears in Heaven.

Dad, your memory is a blessing to me and all who knew you. Holding on to those memories keeps you close to my heart. You’ve gone through the door and I hope whatever is over there is exactly as you described it. You have been released from this world and the pain of illness, and I’d like to imagine you are with your mom and dad having a great picnic. When the time comes (far in the future), please be there to greet me and show me around.

Me and my dad, zichrono livracha

The Write Place (for me)

All the writings, all right here

Don’t Panic, Pt. 7: Synchronicity of Yizkor

Death is a door