Weirdness. Just massive weirdness two and a half weeks ago.

[bertha katzenengel]

Most of you already know my dad died on the tenth when his ultralight plane crashed near Canyon Lake in Riverside Co., CA. Not looking for more hugs. Just want to talk about how weird it is.

It's weird. Weirder than anything I've ever experienced.

Although we weren't close, I knew him and flying. He loved it. I was envious that he could do it, and that he finally had his ultralight. He built it. And he'd only been able to fly it for a year and a half. That's part of the tragedy.

He was only 68 and he was living his life, happily, I think, and he died doing what he loved. I've heard that a million times and the more I hear it the colder the comfort it gives me.

More tragic is his youth. The older I get, the younger it seems "the elderly" are. Ten years ago I would've thought 68 "elderly." But today 68 is young.

Maybe the greatest tragedy is unfairness. Why does an 84 year old man whose mind is almost gone, who has lived his life fully and enriched many others' lives, live on, while a 68 year old man's life is ripped out of him?

I can't keep on with this tonight. I'm going to go to bed, and I hope these thoughts don't keep me awake.

Weird, man. Just. Weird.

[KitchenWitch]

1. I have no answers

I hope you find restful sleep.

:hug:

[Xipe Totec]

2. My dad died at age 48

Leaving six children; his eldest son (me) at age 20. The youngest age 5.

Since then, I've had one brother die at age 30, and another at age 40.

I'm not trying to compare tragedies, just pointing out that death comes to all of us; no exception.

We are stardust.

[bertha katzenengel]

7. Stardust, indeed.

:hug:

[TrogL]

3. My father died in his 80's

He had a series of strokes.

He had no idea who he was, where he was or what he was doing. He was paralyzed one side and couldn't speak. He eventually died of pneumonia because he couldn't breathe properly.

He'd have hated it.

[bertha katzenengel]

8. jesus, Trog

how tragic. i am sorry. :hug:

[TrogL]

4. My father died in his 80's

He had a series of strokes.

He had no idea who he was, where he was or what he was doing. He was paralyzed one side and couldn't speak. He eventually died of pneumonia because he couldn't breathe properly.

He'd have hated it.

[Radio_Lady]

5. These questions are unable to be answered. Only finally accepted, although not understood.

I am 68, what you used to call elderly. I don't think I'm young anymore, and my body and mind remind me of that almost every day.

However, each day I try to face this life with the full knowledge that no one can predict with any accuracy exactly when it will end. My father used to talk about his real mother Eva, who died when he was only five years old. He was raised by her younger sister Ruth, age 21, who married my grandfather in the Jewish tradition. How terrible that a young woman was cut down by blood poisoning while trying to abort herself of a fifth child. Eva already had two girls 12 and 4, and two boys, 11 and 5.

The longer one dwells on this life -- and try to reason out the whys, whens and hows -- the more imponderable it can become. In my opinion, religion may offer some solace and one of many explanations about what lies beyond death, and what is necessary to attain it. Those explanations have never give me any solace. As a teenager, I saw classmates killed in auto accidents, one beloved teacher took his own life because he was a homosexual and accused of a small crime, my grandparents lived short lives and we were not close. Even my own parents lived only into their 70s, and I had many issues with both of them. Besides that, they were 2,500 miles away and visiting presented many financial and personal problems. When my father died at 76 in October 1988 of heart disease, I barely noted it. We had planned to visit them at Thanksgiving, but that was not to be.

I wish I had done better while he was alive, but I pushed it away. I am an only child, and my mother wanted to come and live with us, but we couldn't even entertain the idea. We were so different, and besides, she hated cold weather in Boston. So she stayed in her own apartment in Miami. The police called me in March 1991 when she passed away, of atherosclerosis, at age 71. Her boyfriend found her sitting up at the kitchen table with a glass of water on the table. I hope it was not a painful death.

I think about my parents often, and I wish I could see them and talk with them again. Recently, when we moved to the west coast, I befriended my mother's younger sister, now age 84, and keep in touch with her often. She is a dynamo, interesting, and getting frail. She keeps her sense of humor and she was kind of the rebel in her family. Luckily, my aunt has answered many questions about my mother's family. In turn, we have tried to provide her with a little family, as she lost her ninety year old husband a couple of years ago. We've taken her on trips, and go down to northern California to visit with her. Her only child is a schizophrenic woman who never married and had no children.

So, dear Bertha, it becomes that much more important to live each day fully and as well as possible. Regrettably, it's only when we reach a certain age that the true bittersweet nature of the gift of life can be realized. Our lives are a short journey here on a tiny planet in a magnificent universe we will never be able to fully understand.

Cordially,

Radio Lady in Oregon

[Sock Puppet]

9. This is a very sweet post.

:hug:
I think it's wonderful that you've gotten to know your aunt that way.

[Radio_Lady]

12. Thank you so much, Sock Puppet. You are very kind to mention this.

In peace, :hug:

Radio Lady in Oregon

[Lex]

6. These questions seem weirder to me as I get older,

not less weird.

So I understand you being weirded out be these big questions. I am too.


Hang in. :hug:

[applegrove]

10. I hope you are sleeping okay. I imagine you will have tons of like questions

to get through. Vibes to you Bertha.

[bertha katzenengel]

11. millions of questions

and they all hit while i'm trying to sleep. sigh.

[Radio_Lady]

14. Got your PM... thanks so much, sweetie. Regarding ways to get to sleep...

A doctor on NBC who is now retired (Dr. Art Ulene) came up with a neat way to help fall asleep.

I have used this very effectively and it's ALMOST like counting sheep... BUT...

You start at 1,000 and count backwards by 1, so "One thousand, nine-hundred and ninety nine, nine-hundred and ninety-eight, nine-hundred and ninety-seven..." and so on. He always said that most people don't get past 600 or 500.

I would say that after establishing this pattern and pushing every other thought out of my mind (that's important!), the method works about 90% of the time.

The other 10% of the time? I get up and sort laundry, listen to soft music on my mp3 player, or take a cup of chamomile tea or warm milk, or something else mindless until I get sleepy again. I also TRY NOT TO BINGE ON FOOD (which has been a big problem in years past).

Our bodies are not machines. You are going through a new, and different adjustment phase in your emotional life. Your father is gone, and nothing can change that. Just always try to remember the good times.

In peace,

Radio Lady in Oregon

[SeattleGirl]

13. It is weird, bertha.

My dad died when he was 42; I was 21. It's not fair. 30 years later, I still have the occasional dream that he's not really dead, and he comes back to see me.

When I wake up, I want to cry when I realize it WAS just a dream.

[supernova]

15. You're not alone Bertha

in these types of thoughts.

My dad and I weren't very close when I was growing up. Well, we were for a time up until I was school aged, then somehow we stopped communicating. I'm not sure what about. I never doubted that he loved me, but I didn't really understand him as I got older because I'd be surprised if he said more than 200 words to me the whole time. He wasn't a cold person, just exceedingly shy.

He loved his garden every summer and had a genuine green thumb. I think he could stick a dead twig in the ground and it would sprout if he told it to. :-)

My dad unfortunately passed away 13 years ago when he as 74 while I was away being a married person. I do understand him a lot better now because I am so much like him in some ways, it's uncanny.

I dearly wish he was here so that we could relate better, but, *sigh.*

I hope you will eventually find peace, Bertha.

:hug:

[Radio_Lady]

16. It seems as if we had such mixed feelings about our parents, but ultimately,

when our parents are gone, we do not have a chance to go back and have them with us again.

I will never really forget that I had a violent argument with my mother the night she died. I was in Boston, she was widowed in Florida. I was hospitalized for a depressive episode, trying to adjust to a company that was in the process of reducing their workforce, and my job was definitely at risk.

I was on a pay telephone and I called her collect. I blamed her for our whole unbalanced relationship and brought back the specter of abuse my dead father had inflicted on me, their only child. Today, I understand much more about the dynamics between them and have finally forgiven them for hurts, both real and imagined.

I wish I had been able to do that before they died. So, it seems at least some of the pain or hurt they caused -- and even whatever affection or lack of it -- of growing up with those particular people is ameliorated by time and understanding. Other relatives in a family can serve to help us along the way. They have different views and usually have done some interior examination of this in their own lives, particularly if they are older.

Hopefully, what is learned by this entire experience is a better way to treat my own husband, my grown children, and within my limitations, his grown children. I try to love, care for, and understand them better than I was loved and understood. It hasn't been easy, and I do see traits of both mother and father in myself. So it goes on and on...

Best to all of you who contributed to this thread. I consider all of you my DU buddies and glad to have this exchange with you.



Mommy, Daddy and Ellen in Florida the 1940s