Unexpected Grief
PostPosted: Sun Jul 22, 2007 10:52 am
I lost... a friend? No... maybe, a memory, this week, even though it was six years ago that it really happened.
Confused? Then you feel like I do.
Let me start the story over 30 years ago, in elementary school. There was girl named Shannon who I attended school with, on and off, during my elementary school years (we had two sets of each grade, so some years we would be in the same class, others we wouldn't).
Shannon was a very bright girl, somewhat outgoing. We had one thing in common: we were born on the same day. This was made particularly evident in 3rd Grade, when our teacher, Ms. Gibson, would draw pieces of paper from a box to assign classroom jobs. She did it by birthdate (so that we would memorize our birthdays, I suppose) -- and when she drew our birthdate, Shannon and I would look at each other and yell out "Which one?"
We continued going to classes, nothing special between us (yuck - girls, etc.). But these memories have ways of coming back...
We attended the same Junior High School, but had no classes in common -- the classes were broken down by our language choices, mine was Spanish, hers was French, so we did not have any further school connection.
I remember -- almost vividly -- the day close to the end of the school year when I saw her for the last time -- she had stopped in the hallway while I was at my locker. She was moving (to South Carolina, it turned out). She said goodbye. I waved and wished her luck. And that was that.
Over the next few years, I heard a couple blurbs about her -- she's doing fine, she went to college, she was in acting or modeling -- through some hometown acquaintances who kept track of such things. For a number of years, I heard nothing, and the few people who'd been in touch with her fell from my radar screen as well.
Now, every once in a while, I'll just randomly contact somebody I once knew, just to see how things are. It's kind of fun, and sometimes people actually remember who you are (as opposed to the ones who are nice about the fact that you never registered in their conscience). I'd always played with the idea of contacting Shannon, if I could find her. I thought we might have a laugh about our birthdates, catch up a little, and then say goodbye, this time probably for good. But I couldn't think of a place to start.
Last Thursday night, I went to sleep and had a dream. I dreamt of a new Google map feature that would allow you to see any city, not only as it was now, but as it was in any given year in the past. You could even roll the mouse over a house on the "satellite photo" and see who lived there at the time.
I woke up. At 1:30 AM, I decided I had to get up and see if I could find Shannon. Don't ask me why her of all the hundreds or thousands of people I've known and lost track of in my lifetime. She was the first person who came to mind.
I knew two pieces of information: her first name, and her birthdate. Women's last names, of course, are always dicey for searches because they often change due to marriage, so I just typed in "Shannon" and our birthdate into Google.
I got hits. And there it was -- her full name (unmarried). A birth date. And a death date. It was a memorial site.
OK, I reasoned, she's got a fairly common last name, maybe this is just coincidence. But I also know that Obituaries are one of those things that are very available online. I searched the online obit from a local paper around the date of her death. I got a hit.
"...attended elementary and middle school in Carlisle, Pennsylvania..."
I'd found Shannon. She'd died in a motorcylce accident in 2001, riding with her fiance whom she would have married just a month later. She was 38. Some more searches -- some pictures from a website where she had worked in local theater. Black hair, high cheekbones, smile -- even after all these years, that was her. No doubt.
She had been a professor of French at a local, small college. She spent most of her spare time acting and directing in community theater. Many of the people who'd written anything about her lamented her loss.
OK, so, if you've read this far, maybe you can tell me: why would the passing of a person, who I haven't seen in almost 30 years, who I've thought about only infrequently, who I had no real personal or romantic connection to other than a birthdate and a few years of elementary school -- why would their passing give me a sense of grief and loss?
I've watched classmates grow up, get married, have children. A few have died -- mostly accidents, some disease. Many of my teachers and professors are retired, or have likewise passed away. Yet I can't recall one of them whose death has struck me like this.
Maybe it's the birthdate. Maybe it is the sense of impending mortality. Or survivor's guilt -- I've lived six more years than she did, day for day, what have I done with it? If she'd lived six more years, what greater things would she have done?
Or maybe it was that there was little mention of religious activities in her obit or any sort of bios -- no funeral mass, only a memorial service at a Universalist church -- the sobering thoughts of a life suddenly taken, the Thief in the Night -- was she ready?
RIP, Shannon. May the God of infinite mercy and grace bestow upon both you and I the forgiveness for what we have done and left undone throughout our lifetimes. And give me peace from this peculiar sense of unexpected grief that I just can't quite shake.
Confused? Then you feel like I do.
Let me start the story over 30 years ago, in elementary school. There was girl named Shannon who I attended school with, on and off, during my elementary school years (we had two sets of each grade, so some years we would be in the same class, others we wouldn't).
Shannon was a very bright girl, somewhat outgoing. We had one thing in common: we were born on the same day. This was made particularly evident in 3rd Grade, when our teacher, Ms. Gibson, would draw pieces of paper from a box to assign classroom jobs. She did it by birthdate (so that we would memorize our birthdays, I suppose) -- and when she drew our birthdate, Shannon and I would look at each other and yell out "Which one?"
We continued going to classes, nothing special between us (yuck - girls, etc.). But these memories have ways of coming back...
We attended the same Junior High School, but had no classes in common -- the classes were broken down by our language choices, mine was Spanish, hers was French, so we did not have any further school connection.
I remember -- almost vividly -- the day close to the end of the school year when I saw her for the last time -- she had stopped in the hallway while I was at my locker. She was moving (to South Carolina, it turned out). She said goodbye. I waved and wished her luck. And that was that.
Over the next few years, I heard a couple blurbs about her -- she's doing fine, she went to college, she was in acting or modeling -- through some hometown acquaintances who kept track of such things. For a number of years, I heard nothing, and the few people who'd been in touch with her fell from my radar screen as well.
Now, every once in a while, I'll just randomly contact somebody I once knew, just to see how things are. It's kind of fun, and sometimes people actually remember who you are (as opposed to the ones who are nice about the fact that you never registered in their conscience). I'd always played with the idea of contacting Shannon, if I could find her. I thought we might have a laugh about our birthdates, catch up a little, and then say goodbye, this time probably for good. But I couldn't think of a place to start.
Last Thursday night, I went to sleep and had a dream. I dreamt of a new Google map feature that would allow you to see any city, not only as it was now, but as it was in any given year in the past. You could even roll the mouse over a house on the "satellite photo" and see who lived there at the time.
I woke up. At 1:30 AM, I decided I had to get up and see if I could find Shannon. Don't ask me why her of all the hundreds or thousands of people I've known and lost track of in my lifetime. She was the first person who came to mind.
I knew two pieces of information: her first name, and her birthdate. Women's last names, of course, are always dicey for searches because they often change due to marriage, so I just typed in "Shannon" and our birthdate into Google.
I got hits. And there it was -- her full name (unmarried). A birth date. And a death date. It was a memorial site.
OK, I reasoned, she's got a fairly common last name, maybe this is just coincidence. But I also know that Obituaries are one of those things that are very available online. I searched the online obit from a local paper around the date of her death. I got a hit.
"...attended elementary and middle school in Carlisle, Pennsylvania..."
I'd found Shannon. She'd died in a motorcylce accident in 2001, riding with her fiance whom she would have married just a month later. She was 38. Some more searches -- some pictures from a website where she had worked in local theater. Black hair, high cheekbones, smile -- even after all these years, that was her. No doubt.
She had been a professor of French at a local, small college. She spent most of her spare time acting and directing in community theater. Many of the people who'd written anything about her lamented her loss.
OK, so, if you've read this far, maybe you can tell me: why would the passing of a person, who I haven't seen in almost 30 years, who I've thought about only infrequently, who I had no real personal or romantic connection to other than a birthdate and a few years of elementary school -- why would their passing give me a sense of grief and loss?
I've watched classmates grow up, get married, have children. A few have died -- mostly accidents, some disease. Many of my teachers and professors are retired, or have likewise passed away. Yet I can't recall one of them whose death has struck me like this.
Maybe it's the birthdate. Maybe it is the sense of impending mortality. Or survivor's guilt -- I've lived six more years than she did, day for day, what have I done with it? If she'd lived six more years, what greater things would she have done?
Or maybe it was that there was little mention of religious activities in her obit or any sort of bios -- no funeral mass, only a memorial service at a Universalist church -- the sobering thoughts of a life suddenly taken, the Thief in the Night -- was she ready?
RIP, Shannon. May the God of infinite mercy and grace bestow upon both you and I the forgiveness for what we have done and left undone throughout our lifetimes. And give me peace from this peculiar sense of unexpected grief that I just can't quite shake.