tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post9216427082709870888..comments2023-06-28T22:58:28.247+10:00Comments on Sixth In Line: 'The democracy of death'Elisabethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.comBlogger84125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-23676231503848897512012-02-22T20:36:37.094+11:002012-02-22T20:36:37.094+11:00I agree, Kleinstemotte, about the mixed feelings t...I agree, Kleinstemotte, about the mixed feelings that confront us when a loved one dies. It all becomes part of the grieving process.<br /><br />Thanks.Elisabethhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-88281702081458448272012-02-19T09:05:12.864+11:002012-02-19T09:05:12.864+11:00We all react in ways that are very unique. I don&#...We all react in ways that are very unique. I don't know why we are so pulled and pushed emotionally when we face another individual dying except perhaps by fear of our own time.<br />We seem to put guilt and perusal suffering into the scenario. <br />Grieving then becomes a process that has to be mastered in order to be at peace. <br />Why?Heidrun Khokhar, KleinsteMottehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16174142810114806410noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-5679154646142245752012-02-16T18:43:09.154+11:002012-02-16T18:43:09.154+11:00Thank you for your condolences, Zuzana. It sounds...Thank you for your condolences, Zuzana. It sounds like it was a painful place in which to work, that nursing home. They can be such dreadful places and the specter of death and decay must hang over them - at least over some of them - like a constant cloud. <br /><br />I'm with you when it comes to the end of our bodily presence, even so it's still hard for me to imagine being the dead or dying one, despite my knowing it's inevitable one day. <br /><br />Thanks, Zuzana.Elisabethhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-59385855769371170952012-02-16T18:39:17.798+11:002012-02-16T18:39:17.798+11:00That's a striking contrast, Robert, between th...That's a striking contrast, Robert, between the funerals of your father and mother. <br /><br />We had something similar by way of contrast when my husband's parents died within about three years of one anther. Both were Catholic celebrations but the funeral for the father in this instance seemed to me more lively and it, too, was the second funeral in line. <br /><br /> Maybe it's also harder when one parents remains behind to mourn the loss of their spouse. Once both parents have gone it is a different experience I imagine. Of course religious persuasions must also affect the nature of the event. <br /><br />Thanks, Robert the skeptic.Elisabethhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-89347690885123648822012-02-16T18:35:09.361+11:002012-02-16T18:35:09.361+11:00You're so right, Birdie, death is taboo, akin ...You're so right, Birdie, death is taboo, akin to illness and disability and all the things that bespeak the frailty of our human bodies. <br /><br />I'm glad you managed to take some photos of your mother as she was dying. I can understand how precious these must be, even if they are painful to look at. How sad it is that you did not get a lock of your mother's hair. <br /><br />The preciousness of these reminders of those we have loved who have died is so underestimated. I reckon again it has to do with our fear of facing our own mortality.<br /><br />Thanks, Birdie.Elisabethhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-49371624929727645822012-02-16T06:51:42.876+11:002012-02-16T06:51:42.876+11:00My father was Catholic, when he died the funeral w...My father was Catholic, when he died the funeral was foreboding, dark and disquieting. My mother did not convert and embraced life. So when she died three years later, she had already made arrangements for cremation and an uplifting memorial service with family and friends. My mother's was the most memorable of experiences with death.Robert the Skeptichttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10863488312604865183noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-88761852113758773782012-02-16T02:13:49.373+11:002012-02-16T02:13:49.373+11:00Dear Elisabeth, I have once worked as an orderly a...Dear Elisabeth, I have once worked as an orderly at a retirement center, the end station for so many people. I have never seen anyone die there, as my time there was short, but I saw many on their dead bed. I disliked working there with my entire being.<br />I feel that death is a part of life, whether we like it or not. Once I am gone, I care very little about who sees me or not, or in what state I am in. After all, the privacy we feel about our bodies is somehow connected to the soul, I feel once that is gone, the body is nothing but a shell.<br />I am so sorry for your loss dear friend,<br />xoxoZuzanahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02137958790178864561noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-72359706675847140232012-02-15T19:58:33.276+11:002012-02-15T19:58:33.276+11:00I took several pictures of my mom in her last week...I took several pictures of my mom in her last weeks on earth when we knew she was dying. My sister had a baby and even death could not cover the joy in my mom's eyes. I also took one the day before we decided we could no longer look after her and had to put her in Palliative care. It was to be the last picture taken of her. I have mixed feelings about it. You can tell she is dying but the picture is so raw and beautiful. It hurts to look at it but it also hurts to not look at it. <br />When she was actively dying I wanted to take a locket of her beautiful curly hair but certain family members didn't approve so I didn't. Even after she died and I had left the room I went back to cut a piece but then I felt like I was desecrating her body. I wish I had a piece of her hair now. <br />Death is a strange thing. <br /> It is so taboo. We take hundreds of pictures of birth but none of dying. I think we have gone so far into the "never show weakness of defeat" we don't want to allow it in. But why? We are all made of flesh and blood and dying is our destiny. Maybe photos would help people in the process after a loved one dies. I know the one photo I have of my mom helps me. It helps me see the most beautiful woman I ever knew coming to her end of this life and ready to go one to another. It isn't morbid or shocking. It isn't intrusive or creepy. It is a picture just for me. It is precious.Birdiehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03479872783727855901noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-19488815886885155732012-02-15T19:57:53.633+11:002012-02-15T19:57:53.633+11:00This is such a poignant comment, Kirk, it's ha...This is such a poignant comment, Kirk, it's hard to know how to respond. <br /><br />I recognise the feeling of not taking a hint in the belief that there is no hint there. Rather like the woman who has no idea that her husband's having an affair and vice versa, even when it's staring them in the face. <br /><br />This is not quite the analogy I'm looking for in relation to your not recognising your mother's pending death. As you say, there was unfinished business between you. Now I suppose in some ways it remains so. To me that's sad.<br /><br />I know that Sontag and Leibovitz were both feisty women in their own rights. I did not realise they held such divergent views.<br /><br />Thanks, Kirk.Elisabethhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-26590550655348937812012-02-15T11:18:17.049+11:002012-02-15T11:18:17.049+11:00I stayed away when my mother was on her deathbed, ...I stayed away when my mother was on her deathbed, partly because I didn't know, or wasn't sure, that it WAS her deathbed. Nobody involved actually used the term "deathbed". Nobody actually used the word "dying". Instead, hints were dropped, hints that I didn't pick up on. Or did I? Did I use the vagueness of a hint as an excuse to stay away? I loved my mother, but there were unresolved issues between us. Maybe I was afraid of that final conversation. Suppose, on her deathbed, she had said something that unnerved me, even angered me. I can imagined the reaction of some poor nurse walking into the hospital room and seeing me yelling at a dying woman. The whole thing was also complicated by the fact that I lost my job shortly before her final illness. Most of the time I think of myself as an agnostic, or, if I'm really in a pessimistc mood, an athiest. But at that moment, I didn't seem to be either. Instead, I thought, God wouldn't POSSIBLY let her die knowing her oldest son was out of work. Well, God, or fate, or blind chance did just that. I regret not saying goodby to her, but who knows if I would have even had I been by her bedside. According to those who were by her bedside, she was zonked out of her mind on drugs much of the time, as are most people who die in a hospital. If there is such a thing as life after death, I imagine for her it was like emerging from a stupor, not realizing she had died in the first place.<br /><br />I've been a fan of Annie Leibovitz's work since she first appeared in Rolling Stone way back when. As for Susan Sontag, she was a gutsy woman who dared to say only a week or so after 9/11 that it might have been blowback for US foreign policy. You can imagine the shitstorm that raged over THAT comment.<br /><br />Sontag thought art must rise above the personel, and Leibovitz disagreed. Opposites attract.Kirkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02155991693956178030noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-89447736704715845942012-02-14T21:39:28.378+11:002012-02-14T21:39:28.378+11:00I'll try to find roland Barthes' Mourning ...I'll try to find roland Barthes' Mourning Diary, Mary. Thanks for alerting me to it, and please don't imagine I was thinking you found me reductionist in my thinking. I agree with you: how easy it is to reduce the story of people's struggles with alcohol to one simple story, when their stories are multiple and complex. <br /><br />Thanks again, Mary.Elisabethhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-21311865861752537362012-02-14T21:22:09.459+11:002012-02-14T21:22:09.459+11:00I couldn't agree with you more Persiflage, tha...I couldn't agree with you more Persiflage, that as you put t so well: 'the dying are owed truth, empathy, love and and our presence and touch'.<br /><br />I can understand your appreciation of those photographs of your father in his dying days, Persiflage. How precious they must be to you. And that you could not take such photographs when your husband was dying. <br /><br />As for your children's misgivings, it's harder for younger folk, I suspect. The closer we get to dying ourselves age and experience wise the more readily we can accept these things without squirming. <br /><br />I, too, remember finding photographs of my dead relatives off-putting when I was young.<br /><br />Thanks, Persiflage.Elisabethhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-90165499070043571682012-02-14T21:15:49.378+11:002012-02-14T21:15:49.378+11:00I agree Tracy, grief is such a personal matter and...I agree Tracy, grief is such a personal matter and the idea that someone might get relief by keeping an image of their dead loved one nearby might well be their way of dealing with the loss. <br /><br />There may be a fine line between grief that is constructive as in mourning, however long it might take and complicated as it might seem, as opposed to the grief that comes on endlessly, like Miss Haversham's grief in Great Expectations. <br /><br />Grief is 'designed' I think to help people move beyond the trauma of loss but sometimes people can get stuck in it. But there's little use in casting harsh judgements.<br /><br />Thanks, Tracy.Elisabethhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-87541213063795160622012-02-14T20:30:13.220+11:002012-02-14T20:30:13.220+11:00It's a complex issue this one, Kath, the issue...It's a complex issue this one, Kath, the issue of photographing people in vulnerable positions. It's akin to the business of writing about people in vulnerable positions, but maybe seems more blatant. Perhaps it's the ease with which we take photographs and in which we can view them, whereas reading and writing take time. They are not as immediate. <br /><br />In any case, I recognise how hard it is to view such images. To me it can be like changing a baby's nappy. It's okay when it's your own baby but harder when it's someone else's.<br /><br />Thanks, Kath.Elisabethhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-4510509192433068382012-02-14T16:47:02.166+11:002012-02-14T16:47:02.166+11:00Oh Elisabeth, I didn't mean that YOU were putt...Oh Elisabeth, I didn't mean that YOU were putting out a single story -- rather that any mention of 'alcoholism' inevitably brings to mind that reductionist over-determined narrative of the 'town drunk'.<br /><br />Just wanted to say I came back to give you a link to a review of Roland Barthes' Mourning Diary and his search for a photograph of his beloved mother, but I can't find the review I had in mind. What we search for in photographs of the dead or dying, a fascinating quest.Mary LAhttp://louisey.wordpress.com/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-22185658406534171462012-02-14T12:17:58.535+11:002012-02-14T12:17:58.535+11:00I think my brother in law knew we were there, Cuby...I think my brother in law knew we were there, Cuby Poet, but you're right, we will never know for sure. In any case it was a comfort for us to be there with him. These sorts of efforts cross backwards and forwards.<br /><br />Thanks, Cuby Poet.Elisabethhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-73272802927313348702012-02-14T12:15:50.319+11:002012-02-14T12:15:50.319+11:00I didn't want to present the alcoholic narrati...I didn't want to present the alcoholic narrative as a single story, Mary, but there was no time to allow for more details and I wanted to somehow get across the reason why some people might be less compassionate than they would otherwise be. <br /><br />I hate the notion that all alcoholics are the same. They're not, any more than all diabetics are the same, all cancer sufferers are the same, all schizophrenics are the same. <br /><br />My mother inflicted this notion on us as we were growing up. Along with her favourite mantra. I've blogged about it before: 'Sons of alcoholics become alcoholics and daughters of alcoholics marry them.' As if we are all destined to the same predictable fate, which is ridiculous. <br /><br />I suspect one of my brothers out of five may be an alcoholic and only one of my sisters may have married one. It's not to say we don't many of us struggle with an overlay of anxiety about alcohol and maybe even a tendency to drink too much at times, but alcohol does not run our lives the way my mother predicted. And my father's difficulties went well beyond his alcohol addiction.<br /><br />I agree with you as well about the idiosyncratic nature of grief. People can get into rages when they mourn, rather than cry. And sometimes people avoid situations when they feel grief stricken. <br />Whose to say there's only one way to deal with our grief? <br /><br />Thanks, Mary La.Elisabethhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-65943749769248897512012-02-14T12:05:51.427+11:002012-02-14T12:05:51.427+11:00I didn't find your comment abrupt, Christine, ...I didn't find your comment abrupt, Christine, so you needn't apologise. <br /><br />I can only imagine how hard it is for your family at this time. It sounds like another situation where some are close, the immediate children for instance, and others more removed, as I was with my brother in law. <br /><br />It makes for a strange intensity. My best wishes to you at this time. Thanks, Christine.Elisabethhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-9946655694668632562012-02-14T12:02:24.340+11:002012-02-14T12:02:24.340+11:00Camera Obscura, Jim, that's a powerful piece o...Camera Obscura, Jim, that's a powerful piece of writing. In my mind's eye, I can see the man at his mother's bed unpacking his equipment preparing to take the photos of his mother now dead, photos he could never have taken while she lived. <br /><br />It put me in mind of my own mother, who by way of contrast loves to have her photograph taken. Even in death I fancy she would pose. I say this with tongue in cheek. I cannot imagine my mother's death even now, and I was far away from him when my father died. <br /><br />Maybe you might now find a way of writing about your mother's death, well after the event, when images can come back unexpectedly once you lose yourself to them. I needn't say this to you, Jim. You're a writer you know what I'm talking about. That was part of the difficulty writing this post. It's still so raw it's hard to manage the multitude of freshly emerging memories.<br /><br />Thanks, JimElisabethhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-45565692780831029742012-02-14T10:52:27.331+11:002012-02-14T10:52:27.331+11:00There are so many things in your post. To me, taki...There are so many things in your post. To me, taking photographs is something which can be both valuable and legitimate, but obviously not in every situation.<br />I took photographs of my father during his last few days. He was bedridden, and knew he was dying. He said he did not want to be alone. His large family and grandchildren gathered around. He died while no one was in the room. We children did the daytime and our stepmother cared for him at night, but we had not set out when we received the call to say he had died.<br />I look back on those photographs now and they are very precious to me, although confronting, perhaps, to others. I made a sculpture, from memory, of my father's dying, which I think my children cannot cope with.<br />But I could not have taken photos of my husband as he died. That was too intimate and intrinsic to my life, all my attention was focussed on him.<br />I think the dying are owed truth, empathy, love and and our presence and touch. Awesome is an overused word, but the passing from life to death cannot be described otherwise.persiflagehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05161607100227748374noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-53858063706074013392012-02-14T10:51:49.066+11:002012-02-14T10:51:49.066+11:00I'm with you here, Robert. Bureaucracy does n...I'm with you here, Robert. Bureaucracy does not falter in the face of death, not like the people who make it up. Once the machine of the bureaucratic mob gets into action, mechanised and determined, nothing is sacred.<br /><br />Thanks again, Robert.Elisabethhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-2103472854188272112012-02-14T10:49:40.590+11:002012-02-14T10:49:40.590+11:00When I started to blog, Cheryl I chose not to put ...When I started to blog, Cheryl I chose not to put up photos, relying on my words alone. But more recently I have tried to introduce at least one photo with each post, not only to break up the text, but also to exemplify something of the issues with which I grapple. <br /><br />This post proved the most difficult. It is so hard to represent death visually without risking an affront. I am not interested in gratuitous displays of anything that disturbs people and yet the photo of my dying brother in law seemed to beg for inclusion. Having made the decision to leave it out, the best I could do was try to describe it. <br /><br />Thanks Cheryl. It's good to see you here.Elisabethhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-4828991790220143782012-02-14T10:43:41.065+11:002012-02-14T10:43:41.065+11:00I agree with you, too Ms Moon, In time the photos...I agree with you, too Ms Moon, In time the photos might well lose their immediacy as personal mementos and could then become reflections of art, but not yet, not now. For now they are still too raw, too close to the actual event, and to the man who once was.<br /><br />Thanks, Ms Moon.Elisabethhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-3063237970574175972012-02-14T10:41:35.667+11:002012-02-14T10:41:35.667+11:00I felt enormous relief, Steven, after my brother i...I felt enormous relief, Steven, after my brother in law died. And I believe it was a relief for all of us to see him released from his suffering and for us to be released from the long slow and awful death watch we needed to attend. <br /><br />And you're right, Steven, it was not art, it was life. <br /><br />Thank you.Elisabethhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28133718.post-61804532777680714302012-02-14T10:38:26.065+11:002012-02-14T10:38:26.065+11:00Your comment doesn't feel troll-like to me Rob...Your comment doesn't feel troll-like to me Robert, but if I dare to take you seriously, even in your humour, you will perhaps turn around to mock me. <br /><br />Even so I'll try to respond. You might intend to blow out your brains rather than live your last days in a death bed with or without an audience but instead there might come a time when you don't get the choice. <br /><br />My brother in law had plans for how he would die but once he got into the hospital system he lost most of his ability to choose and along with that his body collapsed and he lost the capacity to act.<br /><br />Thanks, Robert. Your comment feels sad. My father died from the consequences of emphysema and it was not a pretty sight. I can still hear his cough, Craven A, filter tipped, three packets a day.Elisabethhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04015624747225433940noreply@blogger.com