Life and death

Today is a very weird day.

I haven't written about this before on my blog, but last week we wound up losing a co-worker at my work, who suddenly had to be rushed to the hospital and later passed away. It was very sudden and has shocked all of us who worked with her.

Today was her Celebration of Life ceremony. I was on the fence about whether or not I should attend this, as I didn't really know her that well. I ultimately decided to go, as I actually did want to get to know her.

I have only been to one other funeral in my life. Most of the people in my family live in Ontario and I have found travelling to a funeral for family members who have passed on to be not within my financial means to do, so I usually grieve from home.

I do remember the one other funeral I went to. A couple of boys in my drama class in high school were rushing to get to class and slid into the back of a semi-truck in the middle of a cold and icy winter. They had to be removed with the jaws of life and were basically killed on impact. It was really the first time I knew someone who died.

I wasn't really close to them either, but found the experience to be particularly hard to go through. They died so young. Two lives wasted. I can't imagine what that must have done to their family and whether or not they have moved on from it. All I know is I often think about that experience, particularly whenever there is a death.

I was living in Strathmore at the time, and many of my childhood experiences there were not particularly good, as I had been treated as an outcast in that town and learned to close myself up there. I did have a few classes together over the years with one of the boys, who was named Jason. The drama class was the only time I had a class with the other boy, named Clark. The two of them became good friends from the drama class.

Seeing as it was a small town, many of the students in the school decided to go to the funeral. In fact, many of us could not fit into the church and had to stand outside, where they had a big screen and speaker for us to see it. I don't really remember the actual ceremony, but I do remember the song they played, which was "Tears In Heaven". To this day, I can't hear that song without thinking about them.

I find myself sometimes thinking about the play we never got to put on, as they died the day before our dress rehearsal. It was a play called The Creature Creeps. In some ways I usually find myself reflecting on the play that never was. It's like I need to have some kind of closure or something. It was a fun play, after all. Clark was supposed to play Mord, who was a hunchback type of character.

I decided I would save the script of the play and would never throw it away, as I wanted it as a reminder of them. I was sitting in my French class writing on the top of the play to "NEVER THROW AWAY" when the teacher walked by my desk, noticed what I was writing and asked if I was okay. I burst into tears. She asked me if I was close to them. Of course not. I'm not really close to many people. But I do have strong emotions and sometimes feel like I have empathic abilities as I tend to get emotional when other people get emotional. It was also a weird experience knowing that these kids who were practically my age were no longer going to be here anymore. I felt bad for Jason's sister, who was home alone on the day her brother died. I felt... weird.

After I had decided to go to my former colleague's funeral yesterday, I quickly wondered if I would have anything acceptable to wear to a funeral. I'm a very casual dresser and like to wear whatever is comfortable. I also like colour very much. The only thing I had that was somewhat presentable enough to wear to a funeral was a mostly black skirt with purple and pink ribbon like waves splashed across every so often and little white outlines of flowers. I looked for a top to wear to go with it and decided on a thin nylon black shirt. The only problem was I would definitely have to shave my legs.

Side note: usually I wear pants and find the action of shaving my legs to be somewhat of a massive pain to do that usually I just let the hair grow. Unless we are in summer months and I decide to wear more shorts, I figure, "Who has the time? Who really cares? It's not like anyone will ever see them?" feelings about it. In fact, it is a common joke amongst us prairie girls that in the winter women don't shave their legs for the insulation that is so desperately needed. LOL

Again I was faced with the "should I go or should I not go" question, and ultimatley decided it was time to shave off the hair on my legs. I usually use NAIR cream when shaving as it is the easiest and least amount of pain for removing leg hair I have ever used. Just smear on some cream, wait 10 minutes, and wipe it off. Voila! Hairless legs. However, because I have a cat who sometimes decides to use her claws to pull herself up on my lap, the legs also have various cat scratches on them. Yeah, the usually painless hair removal cream stung like crazy for a couple of minutes or so. I also decided to wear panty-hose for probably the first time since maybe my wedding day?

I'm not used to wearing a dress. It's been ages since I have worn a skirt or dress like thing. Sometimes I want to, but usually I don't. I think it's the weight that makes me feel self-conscious whenever I put on a dress. I certainly don't look like I did as a kid. When I was a kid I wore dresses fairly often. There is also the part of me that doesn't really feel all that girly-girl like and find it a little uncomfortable. In fact, because of my added weight over the years, I tend to feel more like a transvestite whenever I wear a dress. However I don't feel quite like that today and actually like wearing this. Maybe my moods have changed. I don't know.

The Celebration of Life was held at a United Church in Surrey. For those wondering about the person that died last week, here is her obituary. We had several cars carpooling to get to the funeral today, and I think in total 16 people came from our office today to pay their respects to her.

There is still this weird feeling that I've been feeling since the tragic day last week. How you are here one minute, and the next you are not. I also found myself feeling weird because many people here described Janet as a private person who kept mostly to herself and that many didn't know much about her. I often feel like I too am very private. Her passing has made me wonder if I should consider opening myself up more to my co-workers.

Janet will be missed here at work, that's for sure.

It is a little odd how funerals are though. To sum up a person's life in a few paragraphs and a photo DVD playing likely her favourite songs and images of her in various stages of her life. It makes me wonder what paragraphs would I be remembered with?

Anyways, I thought I would share this story today as the feelings have been quite bottled up in me over the past couple of weeks. Thanks for reading this (to those who do) and thanks for letting me get some things off of my chest.