Around two hundred people gathered at the local crematorium to say farewell to the young man who took his own life on November 21st. It was a non-religious gathering led by a humanist celebrant.
There were images of the young man projected on to a screen. Images from a comfortable life in the suburbs surrounded by his family and friends. There he was smiling at us. And there were images from his short marriage to a young woman who was his girlfriend from the age of thirteen. Separation had occurred months before his final tragic act. Personally, I would not blame her at all. The self-destructive urges and blue thoughts were happening long before their break up.
His father and five known others carried the coffin into the building. His tearful older sister and younger brother read out suitable goodbye verses and there were two songs that the young man had requested in his final notes - "One More Light" by Linkin Park and "Chocolate" by The 1975 - along with another song - "Lifted" by The Lighthouse Family.
The sun shone brightly on the sharp December morning. A pair of rooks strutted on the cemetery lawn. Afterwards mourners made their way to a pub in Nether Edge where there was a buffet and drinks and conversation.
The young man is already entering history. Months will pass and then years and some time in the far distance there will be days when his mother, father, brother, sister and estranged wife do not fall asleep at night or wake in the morning thinking about him and the space that he has left behind.
He was born under the sign of Taurus in Sydney, Australia in 1988.
Very tender and heartfelt tribute.
ReplyDeleteAnd of course it's not the former wife's fault that this young man couldn't face his life anymore. That's not how it works. I hope she knows that and I mean truly, and in her heart.
I hope there is peace for all, at least eventually. There may never be understanding but peace is, I suppose, a possibility.
Sadly there is some simmering sense that it was her fault. She was kind of sidelined at the funeral service. Not sitting at the front as his next of kin but at the back with two or three of her friends.
DeleteThat's horrible.
DeleteI agree. If there was a fault it was within him - not within her.
DeleteI doubt very much the time will come that those who love him (not loved...love) don't think about him.
ReplyDeleteMaybe others are different in their thinking to how I am...but not a day goes by I don't think about my loved ones...those who are no longer with me; no longer alive.
My mother passed away in 1974...my Nana, in 1976...my brother in 1998...and Randall, my ex husband in August, 2019....not a day has gone by....I can guarantee none will as long as I am alive...
The sadness weighs heavily on that family...grief has not use-by date...grief has no limits...
My father died in 1979, my mother in 2007, my brother in 2010. Like you I think of them every day.
DeleteIt was the young people in my life who exacted the most excruciating pain on their leaving. Someone explained to me, the last thing on your mind at night is the first thing in the morning. However, it's not up to you to not think of the lost person at night. But the time you don't think of that person until noon or supper time is the time you realize the pain is abating.
ReplyDeleteI wish I could tell the world, it's a process. You can only pray for your memories, your regrets, to come later every day.
They say that time heals everything but I am not so sure. The best we can hope for is - as you suggest - abatement.
DeleteSuch deaths make us think much more about the life and cause of their end. There are so many questions without answers.
ReplyDeleteMysteries without solutions and the associated frustrations.
DeleteHow very sad. Mental illness is such a difficult sickness and I do not think the medical community has caught up with it yet. My life has been touched by suicide on several occasions and there simply is no way to deal with it except one day, no one minute at a time.
ReplyDeleteThis is the closest that suicide ever got to me - apart from a schoolgirl I taught. She jumped from a tower block. I think you are right about one day or one minute at a time.
DeleteThe comments above mine make it clear once more that grieving is a little different for everyone, and yet it can also follow similar patterns. Whereas the pain will most likely become less raw and sharp in time, it is also likely that it will never go away completely, and certain events, smells, sounds or sights will keep triggering a stab of grief when we least expect it.
ReplyDeleteYour post is a dignified tribute, not only to the young man but also to his family, friends and neighbours.
I know that memories of Steve are with you every day and that your comment is based on true experience of loss.
DeleteSo very sad.
ReplyDeleteYes.
DeleteA beautiful tribute to this young man. There is double tragedy when the life is so young, he had so many years to live.
ReplyDeleteIf he had died in a tragic car accident it would have somehow been more bearable.
DeleteThe weight of the world seems to be on some people from the get go. How I wish science knew more about the brain and how to "fix" the darkness that some carry. I am sorry for his family, just as I am for my family who deal with the pain of seeing a loved one suffer and have no real way to ease the burden, no answers on how best to handle it.
ReplyDeleteMaybe it is just the way of things Linda. Some see darkness where others see light.
DeleteSuch an awful, bewildering situation.
ReplyDeleteI guess that he must have had some sort of mental illness that was like a long drawn out deathwish.
DeleteThat is a quietly moving description of the event. I've sat thinking about this for a long time - far too long possibly. To me what makes it sad is the apparent lack of celebration of any joy in his life. Perhaps there was. Perhaps there was none to celebrate. It is always dreadful to lose a child because it is inherently unnatural to die before a parent.
ReplyDeleteHe did have joy Graham - the wedding day and a long trekking holiday in South East Asia with friends for example - but even when he was a small boy he seemed somehow disengaged, furtive, sad.
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