Thoughts on a funeral for a 30-year-old-young-man

A few days ago we attended a funeral for a 30-year-old-young-man. We’ve had a lot of sad news recently but I haven’t been able to stop thinking about Nick and his 3 sisters and Mom and Dad and about how we are all members of so many different “families”. We watched these siblings and so many others grow up as members of our local “swim team family.”

For us, the families we joined over the years have been important because we were so far away from our “real” families. I believe that our girls appreciate that we spent so much time and effort giving them families to belong to wherever we have lived. I wish I could explain that value to kids when I see them whining about getting up for swim practice or whatever it is their poor tired parents are “making” them do. I guess I’m just glad that my girls seem to have learned from our efforts as I see them creating their own families in each place they live.

Nick’s sisters eulogized him, each in their own way, but all with honesty about his wonderful talents as well as his faults. One talked about how amazing it was that an “introvert” surrounded himself with so many different kinds of friends and families. And that is sort of what is wonderful about funerals--it’s the one time that all the different parts of our lives come together in one place. Weddings can be like that too, but you have to be invited to attend. Mike and I used to have big parties in February because our birthdays are two days apart. It was always a tad awkward to bring together so many people who only had us in common. I hope to have more such parties because the truth is that I love that we have so many different types of friends. I know which ones are like family because they are the ones who can drive me crazy but I still want to be with them. I know my sister-friends are the ones who can push my buttons just like a sister, but are also the ones I run to when I need to rail and scream about life or death.

Finally, it is horribly trite to say how awful it is to attend a funeral for a 30 year old. How heartbreaking to watch three sisters try to eulogize their older brother. You think about how important are the first 20 years as siblings, but also about how much they will miss in the coming 30-50 years of their lives. There are no words to describe these thoughts. They swirl around in my brain, as if they were trying to find a place to land. But I stood there in that church, trying to find words, thinking a word would make me feel better. I listened to every word spoken by the priests, his sisters, his cousin, his Dad. They all helped and I hoped that having all of us there was helping them. 

My word became SOLIDARITY. 

Perhaps that is what funerals are for. We stand together, hoping that our presence helps that family. We try to hold them up so they can take that next necessary step forward. We hope they can hear our hearts telling them how much we love them and hope they know that every single person in that church would do anything for them. Because, we are all family, all standing with them in solidarity.

The thing is, I’VE ALWAYS HATED PINK!

 Some thoughts on breast cancer, the Komen Foundation, Planned Parenthood, and a letter to Nancy Brinker.

The thing is, I’VE ALWAYS HATED PINK!

I have lost too many people to breast cancer and come perilously close to losing too many others to breast cancer (mother, mother-in-law, cousins, friends). Over the years, I have walked and donated “for the cure” because being surrounded by 1000’s of women was empowering and probably helped me deal with my grief. I kept thinking that if so many people were impacted by this disease, surely we could find a cure. Even after I had my own doubts about SGK I donated so my friends could have that empowering experience.

The news about Susan G Komen and Planned Parenthood has confirmed my New Years decision to do my donating to charities that have less than 2 degrees separation between me and the people they help.

Contrary to popular belief, Planned Parenthood does so much more than abortion. I’m pretty sure they do more to help women than nearly any organization. Something like 90% of their work is for well-women care. Yep, that’s like well-baby care, so that means some percentage is also for ill-women care. And then there’s that troubling percentage for abortions.

Let’s just start walking together anyway!  Sisterhood is powerful. Really. We don’t even have to raise money while walking. We can just be millions of strong women--walking. Komen can keep their pink money. I don’t think Planned Parenthood should take it even if Komen begs them to take them back but that’s for them to decide.

There are so many ways to discuss the news about Susan G Komen and Planned Parenthood. For me, it all boils down to wondering why so many people are against health care for women. Why is there so much hatred toward women? Why is there so much recent legislation aimed at preventing women from taking care of their bodies as they see fit. And why is this legislation being introduced and supported by people who claim they want the government out of “our” lives. Such hypocrisy! Why are these people so afraid of women? Of Planned Parenthood? Planned Parenthood is just a scapegoat for these people who are trying their best to control women’s lives any way they can.

Anyway, back to Komen. Here’s what I’d like to say to Nancy Brinker.

Dear Nancy,

Like you, I lost my sister, Susan, to breast cancer when she was way too young. We had used your web site along with others to learn as much as we could about the disease and treatment. My husband, daughters and I ran and walked in the Race for the Cure beginning after Susan died. Walking with 1000’s of women (and men) was so empowering and I think also helped us deal with our grief. Over the years we also donated in support of friends because we wanted them to have the same experience. I even supported you in spite of my hatred of pink! (I have 3 daughters but never dressed them in pink!)

Meanwhile, during these years, I also started hearing disturbing stories about groups Komen had partnered with, and about some of the things the foundation supported. I also became more and more bothered with the merchandizing of breast cancer, but I set my feelings aside because I convinced myself that what the foundation did for breast cancer awareness was worth it.

When I started hearing that the foundation was going stop helping to fund breast cancer screening at Planned Parenthood, I was very upset. However I figured (and still do) that you could spend your money how you wanted. But then—and I shouldn’t have been surprised—I found that there were too many coincidental things involved.

I can understand how hard it is to stand up to right wing conservative anti-abortion board members and supporters. On the other hand, maybe you agreed with them? And if you agreed with them, then why did you cave in to the outside pressure this week and decide to reverse your decision about funding Planned Parenthood’s breast cancer screening?

So – dear Nancy. In my humble opinion as a fellow grieving sister, please do some soul searching and insist that your organization do the same. I can’t help feeling that your sister must be so disappointed in you. She must be wondering what happened to you and why you can’t seem to stand up for what you really believe in. Do you really want to find a cure for breast cancer? Or is enough to just teach women about awareness and self-checking and early screening? Or maybe you want to do that, as well as fund basic research? Do you really care about women’s health? Or do you mostly care about making sure women can’t ever get abortions when needed? Do you mostly care about maintaining your funding sources from anti-abortion groups? Or do you want to maintain funding from people like me—people who like you, lost a sister to breast cancer?

If I were you—I’d fire the entire board and start over after I’ve figured out my priorities. Or I’d step down because the foundation did not represent me and my sister any longer (unless it does…see above.)

Maybe I’d cut my salary by at least a half. Maybe cut it to the average income of an American woman who is fighting breast cancer without health insurance. Ask the board to do the same. Give the balance of my former salary to Planned Parenthood! Or to my local favorite women’s health center! These steps would be a good way to stand up and make a statement to people like me and to the rest of the world!

Finally, in case you haven’t already figured it out, please know that I will not be supporting the Komen foundation or helping friends participate in a Race for the Cure. Not ever again. Your actions this week have proved to me that you and your foundation have lost your way. I really wonder what Susan Komen would have done? Is this what she meant with her dying wish to you? I thought the story was that she asked you to do something to help find a cure for breast cancer.  

Sincerely,  Joan Adams Sesma

Memory is a blessing

Funeral today for a favorite client—a sweet little old lady who should have had a chance to get really old! I only knew her in a tiny professional way but it I was so happy to learn that she was exactly who I thought she was—the same person in all areas of her life. People described her exactly as I would have. I learned a couple things about her that I didn’t already know—that she was born in Liverpool and that like my own mother, she did not allow the milk carton/bottle on the table. You pour the milk into a pretty pitcher first and put that pitcher on the table!

I was thinking about the last time I saw her and the laughs we shared and how glad I was that I had that chance to see her. Her grandson talked about how he was expecting the last week to be so sad (which it was) but that it was also so joyful and how proud he was to learn how his grandmother had touched so many lives. Now I understand what it means to be “a woman of valor.” And I think I might be getting some understanding of what it means when they say “may her memory be a blessing.”

All that from a little 70+ year old woman who blushed when I told her how much I loved her very short, growing-back-in hair. I was lucky to cross paths with her in this life.

Time Zones to Infinity

February 6, 2011

Had a very strange stream-of-consciousness event this morning. Was thinking about Andi, visiting her Betsy. It’s so hard, going to visit a sister and friend, a sister-friend, knowing you are saying goodbye. Sent up a little prayer on their behalf. Suddenly, I’m talking to Linda, my sweet sister-friend who died in 1994 and how we went to Colorado to see her at Thanksgiving in 1993. I remembered the letter I wrote to Linda telling her how much I loved her and how much she had meant to me. I was praying that Andi had a chance to share all her feelings with Betsy. Then I was asking Linda to be there for Betsy when she arrived and telling her all about Betsy.

Then my sister, Sue shows up in the conversation! This is surprising because she didn’t believe in an afterlife, but I’m telling her what’s up. AND THEN IT REALLY HITS ME. Today is the anniversary of Sue’s death. Ten years. I find myself sobbing. Full body-convulsing sobbing. Of course I think about her ALL the time. But she never really breaks through the wall—the one I built so I don’t fall apart when I think of her. But there she was. Nothing to say…just there.

I’m not looking for any meaning in this. It is what it is. I guess Linda would have called herself Buddhist (from Catholic); and Sue, well, I guess atheist if anything (from Catholic); and Andi, Jewish plus (i.e. open to everything sort of like me.) So there’s no particular intersection. Just me and my thoughts and dreams.

So. There’s really nothing on this day. Just the same old wish and sadness. I wish Sue had let me tell her the things I needed to say—though hadn’t I shown her in so many ways? I wish she hadn’t fought us off there at the end. In my head, I understand. I mean she told us she was afraid we’d take over and I understand. I just wish she would have believed us when we told her we just wanted to tell her we loved her.

Another 365 days without her and still, the words I wrote on the train going back to MD from NY are my best effort at describing my loss. I hope Andi won’t have to feel so empty after 10 years. And I’ll never know if I was as important to Linda as she was to me, but I’m grateful that she allowed me to tell her, because after 17 years, I miss her but at least I know that she knows how much.

Susan, Joni, Marian. Joni's wedding

Susan, Marian, Joni in Greece.

Time Zones to Infinity

I suppose

it’s a good thing we got used to

long-distance sisterhood.

All those years

dreaming

of sitting at each other’s house

talking long into the night

dreaming of meeting for

dinner or drinks or a movie

dreaming of picking up the phone

without a thought of time zones.

I’ve spent 30 years

thinking of you

missing you

reminding myself to write to you

reminding myself to tell you

about a book I read

a movie I saw

a dress I bought

a new hairstyle

a new baby.

Seems like we were always

making plans

trying to figure out

a time

a place

a season

We never needed a reason.

So I guess it was all

preparation

for this.

Now what am I supposed to do?

There is no resolution.

From now on

it will always be a

dream.

Time zones to infinity

and no way to meet

halfway.

I should be used to it.

JAS, 2001

Day 5. Thursday. Mycenae and the Fortress at Nauplion

Lovely, simple table settings greet you after climbing the stairs

Thursday. To Mycenae.

We got started relatively early today. It was hard to leave the rooftop terrace at the Mariana but it helps to be motivated by returning to this magical place that is Myceane.


Here’s a few photos from the rooftop terrace at the Mariana. Breakfast is SO good and they do NOT rush you to finish. Fresh boiled eggs, yogurt and honey…it’s just such a peaceful start to each day.

This photo is after all the food has been cleared.

So—Mycenae. Once again, it leaves me speechless and unable to describe. However, if you want to try to imagine any number of scenes from Greek literature or mythology, this is a good place to imagine it.



Here is a copy of the mask of Agamemnon from the museum at Mycenae. The real thing is in Athens. Imagine being the one to find this artifact!







Just beyond the entrance gate, walking up the hill. Doesn’t look like much from here. But those stones are COLOSSAL!! How did they do that?






Need some perspective to see how huge these stones are? Here is a really awful picture of moi.


I’m sacrificing my dignity to show you the size of these things. I think I’m squinting into the sun. Even the sunglasses don’t help!



On the right, Elena is walking up to the Lions Gate entrance.

The Lion Gate

Mike and Elena under the Lion Gate.

This is a "grave circle." Looking down from just after passing through the Lion Gate.

You can see the tour buses in the upper left corner.

The back of the Lion Gate, below.

I don’t remember walking back so far when we came in 1988. Maybe it wasn't open.

Here, we are on the "back side" and you can see the building below which is the museum and gift shop.

We walked up to the top, and then around and down and around some more and came out at a gate at the back.





Mike and Elena went exploring up and down and around to places I wasn’t brave enough to go. Below.

Some sort of passageway.

More very large boulders. How did they do this?







When we came back around near the entrance, we went down to see the “beehive tombs”—Elena is taking a picture at the entrance to one of them.











Mike is on the inside, taking a picture of us! It’s VERY cool inside, but pretty creepy.

I’m not sure how Mike got these—it was so DARK!




Right: Elena and I are peering into a very dark side room that appears to have some excavating work going on inside.






Below: Looking up, from the center of the floor.



It was cool inside the tombs, but getting hot outside so after we wandered around some more, we decided to go see the museum and see some artifacts.



We bought a few things at the gift shop but they had no stamps so we stopped at "post office" at the bus parking lot to get stamps to mail a postcard to Jesse and Adam. We thought they would appreciate the "Lord of the Rings-ness" of Mycenae.




Then it was time to leave...mostly because we were getting hot and hungry (and when I say we, I mean "I") and so we moved on--back to Nauplion.


This photo looks UP the hill at the fortress. One last look before we left.

But wait! Before we leave this little narrative, let me share these 2 fun pictures. I was trying to recreate a picture I have from our trip in 1988.

I should have looked at this 1988 photo before we came to Greece. This is my sister Marian along with cousin Michelle's foot. I'm not sure exactly where we were standing...it was pretty open then, so we really wandered all over. (Though as I said before, I don't remember going as far back into the ruins as we did in 2009.)

Below is a photo of Elena, posing, per my request to try to reproduce the photo of Mar in 1988.



I wish I had looked at the 1988 photo before we came…but you get the idea..










Driving back from Mycenae, we tried to see Tyrns. But we were pretty hungry so we kept driving. Then we couldn’t figure out where to eat and nearly had a 3-way meltdown about finding an ATM and a place to eat.

Meanwhile, while we drove around looking for an ATM and a place to eat, we took some pictures of the buildings!

.

However, we didn’t take pictures of the place we ate or write down the name. We did, of course, take pictures of our food! As usual, it was amazing.

Giant white beans—Elena keeps looking for the perfect replication of her white beans from Rhodes.

Also dolmas and fries; and stuffed red peppers

It probably doesn’t look like much food for three hungry people…somehow it was and we weren’t sure we had the “get up and go” enough to do anything else!

But we really wanted to see the Palamidi Fortress that sits above the city. We knew we would have to drive so we started up the hill and then decided to drive down the other side---thinking we might drive to Tolo, where we stayed in 1988. But it was late in the day so we turned around to go to the fortress.

From the Mariana, we have seen people climbing the 800++ steps to the fortress. We did not do that!

Palamidi Fortress.

This fort was built during the Venetian occupation in the early 19th century and consists of eight bastions, each was self contained, ensuring that if one bastion was breached the others could still be separately defended. The bastions were built one on top of the other and they all connected with one wall.

The Venetians named the bastions by ancient Greek names, such as Leonidas, Miltiades, Achilles, Themistocles, to give emphasis on the strength of the castle. The struggle for liberation from the Turks began at Palamidi fort.


Palamidi was also used as a prison for a period of time. In 1833, Theodoros Kolokotronis, one of the Revolution leaders was imprisoned here, charged with high treason. Prisoners were made to do physical labor and the 999 steps leading up to the fort were in fact built by the prisoners under the supervision of the Bavarian army.



I have no idea where we are standing, but Mike is looking down at us from somewhere above! Below us is more of Nauplion--suburbs!

This place is so amazing! We just kept walking around from one building to another. Mike was exploring in his own way and taking pictures of us!

Looking down at Nauplion from the fortress:
The long rectangular, yellow building with the red roof that sits in the center of this photo (vertically) is the building of the Mariana where we stayed.

To the left and up just a tad is the (square) building with the breakfast terrace. The building in the lower left is another hotel.

We had to rest for awhile when we got back from the fortress and then decided we would just walk until we found a place to eat.

From the Mariana, we walked down the stairs and down the alleys.

We just wandered around, checking shops, looking at menus, and finally stopping at a small corner place with tables on a side alley



"Small Fish, Fried." Perhaps the best menu description ever!

Also, tomato salad, beet salad, bread, and I think octopus again!

















Walking back to the Mariana, Elena insisted we needed to try gelato! She was right of course.

Tuesday. Day 10. Leaving Greece

Tuesday. Eat. Pack. Leave.

Well, just because I've written about every day of the trip, I'll include this last day. Unfortunately, we don't have any photos! We didn't take many, but then Elena lost most of hers when her hard drive died. She had taken a few from the airplane as we took off and were leaving Greek airspace.

It was a travel day, so all we did was finish packing, eat a little breakfast, then drive to the airport. The rest of the day was spent in planes and airports!

I'm going to post some more of my favorite pictures later, including the stairs at the Mariana in Nauplion. Also the video of Sotirios telling the story of "stand up."

In spite of the sad ending, this trip far exceeded any expectations I had for it. I didn't get all the honey I hoped to bring back. That's probably good, because it actually takes awhile to finish off a jar of honey. We still have one jar we haven't opened.

I have much more to say about the trip, and plan to tell you about Betty's funeral, and then maybe I'll just keep writing...til who knows when. In any case, this brings us to the end of this part of Honey Lights!
γνῶθι σαὐτόν
Know Thyself!

Monday. Last day. Trying to shop

Monday. Last full day.

To be perfectly honest, I don't think any of us remember much about this day. It seemed like such a good idea to save the last day for shopping and not have any plans. I guess it was...we probably weren't capable of much.

As we did everyday...we got up and went down to a breakfast buffet at the hotel. It was simple, but somehow perfect. How can you go wrong with yogurt, honey, fruit, a little pastry, a boiled egg, and of course, coffee.

We walked the few blocks to take the tram into Athens for shopping at Plaka. We took the tram to Syntagma Square and then walked to Plaka. We managed to get a few gifts but our hearts were no longer in it. We spent nearly an hour in a leather shop trying to pick leather bags for the girls. We couldn't even make that decision! Well, we did, but it took almost an hour!!

We ate lunch and then took the tram back to Glyphada.

We needed some internet so we went to Starbucks where we knew we could get internet (Elena’s ticket was messed up, thanks to my error, and we had to get a new one. Also, we needed to check emails about the funeral plans.)




It was pretty late (but normal dinner time in Greece!) and we walked around looking to find a restaurant for dinner—checking menus—and finally ended up at “Georges and Zachs”.

One more amazing meal before leaving Greece. The waiter let us go back and pick our food...they didn't have all the menu items left! There was a large group of some sort, so we figured maybe they had eaten all the food!!

This group provided us entertainment....it was two long tables full of Greeks celebrating something...They were singing and having a grand time. Should have taken a video but we were really kind of out of it.
















I don't think we were rushed through any of our meals in Greece. This night was no exception. We really just wanted to sit around and stare into space! What better place to do that than in Greece!



Finally, we went back to the hotel to pack, check emails, talk to Amelia, sleep a little.