Death is never easy. People make you feel like when they're older, when they've been sick, when they aren't children - it's easier. They've lived a full life. That's not true. It's still hard. It's still the thing that splits you open, with a canyon bigger than the great one settling into your heart. This one seems even harder.
I don't know why. Is it because Lyndsie was young? Only 32. Was it because we grew up together, basically? Could it be because she has a beautiful little almost three year old? Perhaps it's because her smile could, since she was a child, light up a room - it was infectious. Maybe it has something to do with the season. "Dead Dad" day was just a few days ago. This time is rough for all of us. Or maybe it's just because it isn't fair.
Life isn't fair. And death is even less so. It doesn't discriminate. It doesn't take into account how much you're loved, the sense of loss that the world will feel without you. It has no care about how your little girl will grow up without knowing her mother, but certainly will hear about how much she is the spitting image her. Death could care less than you die the day after Christmas. As far as death is concerned, it did you a favor by giving you that last holiday. And maybe it did. Family gathers, friends are there. Does that make it easier? Does anything make death easier?
We try to kid ourselves, tell ourselves that it's in God's plan. That God knows what he's doing. Maybe that's right. Perhaps we are all just not privy to his plan. To that I have a little something I would like to say:
Author's Note: Today is five or six days since I wrote this and stopped. I've tried to pick it back up a few times. But it's been the hardest thing I have tried to do in months. And you guys know me, always doing something stupid - so for this to be the hardest thing. You have to know how tough it's been.
I've been watching the posts come across my Facebook newsfeed. Reading stories about how many lives she touched in her short years, and seeing her million dollar smile over and over again. And I figured - today is the day. New year and all. Finish it. And since the last thing Lyndsie ever said to me was this:
I feel I have to somewhat live up to this expectation. Humor has always been easy for me. In the darkest of situations, I make terrible jokes. The day before Lyndsie passed away, we received news that George Michael had died. Immediately I blurted out: Do you think someone woke him up before he went went?
I'd say it's a real gift. But it's also probably a curse - mainly for those around me. My life has never been charmed, it hasn't been perfect - but it's always been full of laughter. Even and especially in the moments where others struggle to find any positivity. And always in those seconds where you shouldn't make a joke - there I am. Always. These last few days have still been filled with jokes and laughter.
Some of Lyndsie's family came over the day she died and we shared some funny stories. We laughed together, there were tears shed that day, as well. So it isn't as if I haven't found humor. But sitting down and writing this makes it feel so final. More final than knowing her services were over last night. More set in stone than the phone call I received that morning. Or the post I saw on Facebook that sent me scrambling to find where my mother was so I could let her know.
I made a resolution to myself that this year (amongst other things like reading more and learning to love the life I live even further) I would write more. Maybe here, but always somewhere. At least once a week. And this seems like a fitting way to begin that resolution to myself. With my first little sister, as she says.
Lyndsie and her family moved away when we were younger, but they always still felt like family. Once, she came back to visit and stayed with us. I can still remember her, sitting on the top bunk bed in my room. Swinging her feet. Probably with that notorious smile plastered on her face. I can't even tell you what happened next. But it resulted in her grabbing the framed picture off the wall and it ripping. She probably fell, to be honest. But being in big sister mode, all I can remember is thinking: that little brat just ripped my collector's edition-very expensive-very amazing-verypriceless picture of George Harrison. Who just so happened to have been my favorite Beatle. My mother sat me down and explained to me that no we can't have a formal trial. No, we aren't going to put her in "the hole". And absolutely not, you can't make her sleep outside in a tent for the remainder of her visit.
I forgave her. As you do little sisters. And I still laugh about it. But it did teach me a very valuable lesson, honestly. About accidents. About forgiveness. About how littler sisters will touch everything and break all your things. And you can't return them, because there is no gift receipt with a little sister. My blood sister should thank Lyndsie for training me so well. Because it probably saved her from being put on the Internet in later years. Sister for sale: will pay you to take her.
I will, however, let you know that during that same visit, when my father made Lyndsie eat green peas and she cried and told him how he was the meanest man alive and how this was torture: I didn't stop him. I didn't speak up for her. I ate my green peas (that I detested) with a smirk. And that's when she also taught me about karma and about silent revenge. Also very important for a big sister.
In true Jim Carpenter fashion, that year for Christmas he wrapped up a can of green peas and sent them to her as if they were a present. Consider that my next lesson she taught me: how to laugh at someone else's pain. Seriously though, green peas are the worst. But that did not stop me from posting this to Lyndsie's page when they sent her home from the hospital a few days before her departure from our Earth.
Lesson there: a good joke never dies. And memories live forever. They make us laugh, they can make us cry. But they can also remind us just how much we loved and still do care for someone. Even when they're miles away. Even when there are years between visits.
Lyndsie passed away the same day of my Dad's service. And I can only imagine he was there, greeting her with a smile, open arms, and a plate full of peas. And reminding her to eat her vegetables. With any luck, in Heaven, you don't have to do what men with giant mustaches tell you to do.
I feel at peace to know that someone was there who knows Lyndsie the way I do there to help her along the way. I feel a sense of happiness that the last thing she probably ever read from me was "love you!"
When Lyndsie's battle got tough (not that it all isn't) a few months ago - my family sent a card a day for a month. Just a little reminder someone was thinking of her. We sent a few shirts with my Dad's face on it. I regret I did not send a can of peas in time. But a few weeks before her passing, my mom found "worry stones" with the patron saint of cancer on them (who the hell decided that cancer needed a saint, by the way? It's way more a fallen angel moment, if you ask me). We signed a card, she tucked one for Brenda and one for Lyndsie into a card and sent it out. To the same address we had sent over 30 cards in the last few months. This weekend, it was returned in the mail. One stone missing, a tiny tear in one side of the envelope and a sticker saying: no such street. We double checked the address. It was correct. I like to think that some how, some way, Lyndsie got her stone - one way or another. And that she passed know how cared for, how loved, how cherished she was in her short time we got to have her with us on this planet.
I hope she knows that the final lesson she showed her "big sister" was how to be strong, resilient, graceful, and full of fight.
And I hope she knows I have to make one more bad joke: George Michael wasn't kidding when he said he wasn't planning on going solo, kid. He took you with the next day. WHAM! Just like that.
And with that, I bid you goodnight. Tip your waitress, try the veal. And make sure you all finish your veggies. Dad's watching.
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