Like many in my generation, I have two families: the one I was born with, and the one I later chose. My biological family lives five time zones away. My "urban family" -- pretending for a moment that I live in an urban area -- consists of a dozen or so close friends, many of whom are similarly displaced ex-pats trying to finish their doctoral work. For my birthday each year, and most holidays, I can expect to celebrate with my urban family. When I am sick, it is not long until they are, too. When I am in the hospital, the initial phone call goes to A, my closest friend even though we have known each other for less than four years.
Because we are ex-pats, stuck in a similar set of circumstances, each trying to create a life in a place we wouldn't know existed but for the University, it is easy to become a part of our urban core, our little tribe. And once you are in, you are in until you choose to not be. Friday nights come with beer, occasionally we'll enjoy movies on a Saturday, a walk on a Sunday, or simply a mid-afternoon tea with life updates. The bond is quick, and grows deep much sooner than normal circumstances would allow. In the past year, we attended a wedding, celebrated an engagement, and ... this week, faced death.
My family is reeling as a friend died unexpectedly, and unexplainedly. We have heard the thus-far-official-word, but that word does not make sense. It cannot address the reality we knew, the friend we grieve. We have been less than satisfied with the way officials around us have handled this, so it is our family that started to make arrangements. It is our urban family that has reached out to his biological one, offering support, trying to understand the un-understandable, and explain what we ourselves do not fully know. We feel the burden of pushing the police, pushing the University, and pushing anyone who will listen, to take this death seriously. He has no one else to do that. If his family were here, they could prod and coax, push and shove people to take seriously their demand for answers. They could plan his funeral mass, and honour his passing with words and prayers, poetry and flags. Without them, it is our duty, our obligation, our need.
Our society is not built for friendships such as these.
Our experience is not worthy of accreditation or legal protection. So we are lost and forgotten. We did not get a call from the hospital to tell us in advance; we did not get a call from the police to inform us after it happened. Some of us learned from a newspaper article online, telling us unceremoniously of our friend's death. Others, more than 24 hours later when the University's support team informed us. Still, we know others of his friends do not know at all yet.
Our society is not built for friendships such as these.
Our University gives bereavement of 6 days for a dependent, but for other family members and "close friends" only a day. How do you explain that close friends are not simply friends when you are far away from those who share your bloodlines? They are more; they are your core; the ones you depend on and the ones who depend on you. If I were to have dependents now, they would be my office-mates, the ones I care for, buy cookies for, proofread articles for, cry with, listen to, seek comfort in, and hug more now than ever before (and I, my friends, am a hugger by nature).
Our society is not built for friendships such as these.
How do you explain to those who do not have this life or experience that simply going to my office -- across the hall from his -- is an act of courage and strength I did not think I had? That at times I have worried about dehydration simply because of the tears that have come from me - more tears than I thought I could shed. How do you explain that you are aware you should be moving on, but you can't - that the closest you can get at this moment is unconsciously placing one foot in front of another, and hoping that carries you along until you actually remember how to walk? How do you explain that while you are not related, the death has taken a piece of your family?
Our society is not built for friendships such as these.
I have faced death before, and at times in this experience I have been all too conscious of my own grieving process, and that of those around me. We all have. The number of times we have told one another that what we are experiencing is normal comes almost close to the number of times we have said out loud how none of this makes sense, how surreal this is. We know we have to get to a point of acceptance. We know this will take time. We know that we have to ride all five stages of grief, and then ride them all again. We know this process will repeat over and over until one day it doesn't. Or until one day, one of those stages takes up two days, and then a week, and then a month. And then we will think we are fine and have accepted our realities... until one day we will find ourselves crying unexpectedly over a Game of Thrones episode, a banana or new gym shoes. We know we will start again in the moment, and we know that in that moment we can and likely will turn to our urban family for comfort.
Tomorrow will be six days. Tomorrow, like all who have said goodbye to a family member, I will try to return to my routine, knowing it will be anything but.
Because we are ex-pats, stuck in a similar set of circumstances, each trying to create a life in a place we wouldn't know existed but for the University, it is easy to become a part of our urban core, our little tribe. And once you are in, you are in until you choose to not be. Friday nights come with beer, occasionally we'll enjoy movies on a Saturday, a walk on a Sunday, or simply a mid-afternoon tea with life updates. The bond is quick, and grows deep much sooner than normal circumstances would allow. In the past year, we attended a wedding, celebrated an engagement, and ... this week, faced death.
My family is reeling as a friend died unexpectedly, and unexplainedly. We have heard the thus-far-official-word, but that word does not make sense. It cannot address the reality we knew, the friend we grieve. We have been less than satisfied with the way officials around us have handled this, so it is our family that started to make arrangements. It is our urban family that has reached out to his biological one, offering support, trying to understand the un-understandable, and explain what we ourselves do not fully know. We feel the burden of pushing the police, pushing the University, and pushing anyone who will listen, to take this death seriously. He has no one else to do that. If his family were here, they could prod and coax, push and shove people to take seriously their demand for answers. They could plan his funeral mass, and honour his passing with words and prayers, poetry and flags. Without them, it is our duty, our obligation, our need.
Our society is not built for friendships such as these.
Our experience is not worthy of accreditation or legal protection. So we are lost and forgotten. We did not get a call from the hospital to tell us in advance; we did not get a call from the police to inform us after it happened. Some of us learned from a newspaper article online, telling us unceremoniously of our friend's death. Others, more than 24 hours later when the University's support team informed us. Still, we know others of his friends do not know at all yet.
Our society is not built for friendships such as these.
Our University gives bereavement of 6 days for a dependent, but for other family members and "close friends" only a day. How do you explain that close friends are not simply friends when you are far away from those who share your bloodlines? They are more; they are your core; the ones you depend on and the ones who depend on you. If I were to have dependents now, they would be my office-mates, the ones I care for, buy cookies for, proofread articles for, cry with, listen to, seek comfort in, and hug more now than ever before (and I, my friends, am a hugger by nature).
Our society is not built for friendships such as these.
How do you explain to those who do not have this life or experience that simply going to my office -- across the hall from his -- is an act of courage and strength I did not think I had? That at times I have worried about dehydration simply because of the tears that have come from me - more tears than I thought I could shed. How do you explain that you are aware you should be moving on, but you can't - that the closest you can get at this moment is unconsciously placing one foot in front of another, and hoping that carries you along until you actually remember how to walk? How do you explain that while you are not related, the death has taken a piece of your family?
Our society is not built for friendships such as these.
I have faced death before, and at times in this experience I have been all too conscious of my own grieving process, and that of those around me. We all have. The number of times we have told one another that what we are experiencing is normal comes almost close to the number of times we have said out loud how none of this makes sense, how surreal this is. We know we have to get to a point of acceptance. We know this will take time. We know that we have to ride all five stages of grief, and then ride them all again. We know this process will repeat over and over until one day it doesn't. Or until one day, one of those stages takes up two days, and then a week, and then a month. And then we will think we are fine and have accepted our realities... until one day we will find ourselves crying unexpectedly over a Game of Thrones episode, a banana or new gym shoes. We know we will start again in the moment, and we know that in that moment we can and likely will turn to our urban family for comfort.
Tomorrow will be six days. Tomorrow, like all who have said goodbye to a family member, I will try to return to my routine, knowing it will be anything but.
