I’ve been savoring Steven Johnson’s Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities, and Software for some time now. It’s a fluid look at the ideas behind bottom up organization and self organizing systems. Our lives are filled with self organizing systems and yet we are blind to most, if not all, of them.
As a developer of automated systems I find the insights gained from self organizing ant colonies or human cell biology key to my better understanding of the applications I develop. As a person I am thoroughly enjoying a fascinating look into how our world really works.
Rating: Read it slowly, thoughtfully
One of the undercurrent emotions I’ve been surprised to deal with in the midst of my grief is envy. In retrospect I suppose it isn’t so surprising, after all, every where I look there are people who have what I don’t.
Companionship.
It’s in the lunch time conversation about the difficulties of traveling for work and having to spend evening meals alone. I spend all my meals alone; sometimes I skip a meal just to avoid Michele’s empty space.
I’m jealous of the birthday dinner a coworker is having with their family. Living apart from a family that doesn’t go to any effort to celebrate birthdays, and now living alone, means I am now faced with spending my next birthday alone.
Envy rears as I watch couples together in the bookstore, or movie, or grocery store. And that envy turns to anger when I see them acting rudely towards each other. Don’t they know their connectedness is fragile and precious? That what is here in this minute can be gone in the next?
I am envious of all of you who have some one to love, some one to hold, some one to be with.
Events seem to be conspiring against me these days. Friday morning as I was arriving at work my cell phone rang. One of my best friends (and perhaps Michele’s best friend of all) had just lost her brother. With my own grief still prominent in my daily life learning of her loss was tough. I talked to her again this morning, and I hope my feeble efforts to comfort her help to ease her way through this toughest of transitions.
I also had a call from my parents today. My mother’s lung cancer, it appears, has returned. She has been having trouble with shortness of breath lately and a chest x-ray revealed a new mass in her lung. She is to have a MRI Monday, and will likely start a new round of treatments this week. Because she has never pursued prognosis details from her doctors no one has any real idea about her true condition.
Just shoot me now.
In the days that followed Michele’s death I started a diary, most of the entries in it are ragged, but upon rereading them tonight one caught my eye and I’ve decided to share it here. It was originally written on Tuesday, October 11th, the day after she completed suicide.
October 11, 2005 10:45 am Over the weekend leading up to Michele’s death she had two near death experiences. The first occurred Saturday morning just after we had gotten up and come into the living room. She was sitting in the big chair and I was sitting across from her while we were talking. All at once her breathing became rather ragged and strained, and she seemed farther away. I moved to her side and held her hand and stroked her hair and face as her breathing became shallow and less strained. She looked at me and told me that she loved me and that she wanted me to continue my life. She then said it was very peaceful. I continued to hold her hand and tell her that I loved her and that it was okay if she left.
Once or twice it seemed like her breathing had stopped only to start again. After about 5 minutes she seemed to ease in the chair and she felt closer again. More time passed and she appeared to be sleeping very deeply and peacefully. I stayed by her side until she awoke about an hour later. Her experience was one of moving away. She said there was a light off to the side but that whenever she turned towards it, it moved away.
On Monday morning we both woke up about 5:00 and lay in bed talking for a time. It was a loving, tearful, joyous conversation filled with memories, laughter, and talk about the upcoming days. Again I became aware of her seeming farther away, her eyes weren’t focused on anything any more. I stroked her hair and face and told her that I loved her dearly, that I always had and that I always would. Her breathing was so shallow that even with my hand on her side I could barely feel each inhalation. This time it was longer before I felt her coming back towards me. And this time she slept for a couple of hours before waking again.
Her experience was one of being in the light. She talked of seeing her mom and dad. She also said that she saw my sister, Amy, and that Amy asked her if she was really ready to leave me. When Michele couldn’t answer she said she came back here.
Both of these episodes left her peaceful and calm for a time. I think her fear was that going to the hospital for the bone scan would have caused them to discover her condition and intervene. The last thing she wanted was to be kept alive or subjected to medical interventions that artificially prolonged her life.
I remember asking her during the start of the second one if she wanted me to call an ambulance. She said no, that she wanted to be at home where it was peaceful and quiet, with me. One of the greatest lessons she ever taught me was the importance of not taking care of yourself by imposing your will on others. Loved ones who plead with the doctors to do anything to save a dying person are really trying to take care of themselves, perhaps against the true wishes of the person. I have known for a long time that Michele didn’t want any kind of artificial, or heroic measures taken to prolong her life.
I am largely at peace with her death today. I know that her spirit has moved on to the next plane of existence. Further I know that the pains and sorrows that fill this life aren’t a part of that next existence, so she is finally free of her nightmares, her bleeding and dysentery, and her fears of the world.
In the past two weeks I have attended two different survivors of suicide group. My motivation for going has been an increasing level of frustration and outright anger about little things, particularly when I am at home alone. In part I think my anger is about the unrelenting nature of grief. Almost every other experience you live through is either time limited, or feels good even if it lasts and lasts. Grief has neither of those attributes. Every time I turn around it is there, waiting for me; implacable, unreasoning, seemingly unending.
Expressing myself to close friends has gotten me a long ways, and I will certainly continue to avail myself of their love and compassion. Relationships are like an alloy metal, forged in the heat of shared emotion, containing elements of both participants. The relationships I am continuing to forge with my closets friends has only been made stronger by this new round of tempering.
But talking to people without a common experience can only carry me so far. In the end I am trying to express an agony for which there is no language except common experience. Therefore I have sought out these two survivors of suicide groups. Attending group is a new experience in and of itself, so I am aware that my first impressions are more about the oddness of exposing myself to strangers than anything else. I am planning on continuing to attend for at least three months before deciding whether or not to continue.
My first impressions are several and varied. I’ve met a total of 8 individuals or couples that have all had someone complete suicide. Two have lost brothers, the rest children. I am the only one who has lost his or her spouse. And, without more details about individual circumstances, it appears that Michele was the only person choosing suicide instead of a protracted illness. I feel set apart from the group due to these two facts. Both groups have an underlying agenda regarding suicide prevention and education, and I recognize that the loss of teenage or young adult children is the root of this movement. I feel it is appropriate and worthy to pursue, but I know it isn’t what I am looking for.
I am looking for a place to express all my thoughts, my emotions, my fears. I am looking for a place where I can’t manipulate the situation to shelter me from the darker places my emotions want to carry me. I need someone who won’t be cowed by my tenacity or will to dominate the interaction. What I need, I think, is a skilled bereavement counselor. I feel the group will be useful for me, but too easy to manipulate to really provide any true growth opportunities. I guess I need to seek out a professional counselor.
Today is the anniversary of the day I asked Michele to marry me. That she said yes filled me with joy and happiness. I was proud to be her husband and honored to be her friend. Today I have mixed feelings, but mostly I am having good memories. I’ve written more about it on her site, andifyoudidknow.com.
I spent the last week or so listening to Blink! The Power of Thinking Without Thinking in the car, and thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it. An exploration into our intuitive selves, Blink! examines our ability to “thin slice” information and to make amazingly accurate inferences from tiny bits of information. This book will alter the way you look at your thoughts.
Rating: Buy it and listen to it. Twice.
After letting my intention to have a page of my movies, books, and other media diversions languish for a year, I have finally gotten my act together and configured it the way I want. Now I can make entries that will appear on the main page that will also be picked up by the diversions page. The old system required a double entry and therefore never happened.
Despite a cyber-ish sounding name, Firewall isn’t really about computers or hackers or even firewalls. It’s really about a man trying to protect his family from bad guys. All in all not a bad movie, just not a great one either.
Rating: Wait for the DVD release
An altogether excellent film about the indomitable spirit of Burt Munro and his quest to prove his largely hand-built Indian motorcycle was the fastest in the world. Along the way he meets and charms a number of ordinary people. Anthony Hopkins is perfect as Burt Munro, and The World’s Fastest Indian is a perfect Sunday afternoon movie.
Rating: Go see it in the theater