Living under a death sentence

It’s Thanksgiving Day in America, so you know the drill. This is the Super Bowl of gratitude, the occasion on which we’re meant to take a little time—a single day out of 365—to pause and reflect on the things in our lives that essentially bring us joy.

That’s what gratitude is, right? The realization that something or someone brings us joy. It might be a momentary flicker or an all-encompassing wave of delight, but saying, “I give thanks for this” is really the conscious acknowledgement of that happiness. One day out of the year for this is just the teensiest bit paltry, in my opinion, but still—let’s make the most of it.

For the past few years I’ve made a concerted effort to practice gratitude daily. This isn’t always easy; there have been days when I only grudgingly and after much flailing about come up with three things to name out loud as being worthy of thanks. This very month, following the attacks in Paris and for the first time in years, there were two days I couldn’t find the heart to do even that.

I’ve been thinking a lot about all those lives in shards after that Friday night. No warning and no reason. Lives ended, bodies maimed, families and friends bereft and bewildered. One minute a play on the football pitch, a rock song or a bite of dinner; the next explosions, automatic fire, screams, blood, death. No one knew when they headed out that night that this was in store. They weren’t prepared to die, and they didn’t know to prepare their loved ones for their deaths.

I, on the other hand, count myself as fortunate. I had the grace, the blessing of knowing that my days with my BFF were numbered. She died last month, five years after being diagnosed with ovarian cancer, a bastard of a death sentence. Pretty much from the beginning, Leilah did a magnificent job of facing the future, and she prepared us for that every step of the way.

And this was a tremendous gift to me. After initially totally screwing the pooch for a couple of months, I did my best to be brave, supportive, encouraging, silly, honest and loving, whatever state of mind I found her in. Knowing her time was precious, we made super use of it by communicating openly and, in the end, fearlessly.

Example: last summer I asked her, “Listen—all those years when I made fruitcakes and gave them to you at Christmas: did you really like them, or were there a lot of very tipsy birds around your house? It’s okay, you can tell me the truth; I’m never going to go to the trouble of making them again.”

No, she really liked them. A slice of fruitcake and a cup of tea were just what she needed on some days.

This year, when she finally stopped the chemotherapy, we doubled down. She’d planned to hook a small rug for me in a Celtic knot pattern, but she realized she wouldn’t get to do it. So she sent me one in an Amish pattern that she’d made a couple of years ago. I told her I’d put it next to my bed so it would be the last thing my feet touch at night and the first thing they touch in the morning.  And so it is.

On my recommendation, she watched Fantastic Mr. Fox—Bill Murray as Mr. Badger was what did it. She loved it, high praise as a career children’s librarian who wasn’t all that wild about animated films.

I started jotting down memories—pie (she basically introduced me to real pie), getting so involved in our conversation while out on a hike that we ended up halfway to Baja before we realized we were lost, smuggling her cat Angela across the Oregon-California border, our respective weird cousins (mine are contenders, but hers sweep all categories), flying to Borrego Springs in their Cessna…for brunch—and scribbled them across several cards. Just reminders of shared experiences, conversations, laughs, close calls. I came nowhere near covering the depths, but I gave what we researchers might call a representative sample, and she was tickled to have card after card arrive, all those cues to fire up her own memories.

She did her own version—for my birthday last summer she sent me a carton with many small gifts, which included a pair of earrings I’d given her about 40 years ago, her mother’s pilot’s log book and two sterling serving pieces that simply beg to be used at a dinner party. It was Christmas in August.

My last conversation with Leilah was right after my job interview in DC in October; I called her the instant I walked into my hotel room and got those interview shoes off. She was so pleased to hear the enthusiasm and confidence in my voice; that came through the slight driftiness of the morphine. It was a good conversation, and it ended (as our calls have done for more than five years) with us saying, “I love you.”

A week and a half later she was dead. No more phone calls, movie recommendations, surprise packages at the door. But the legacy of a deep friendship that enriched my life and made me a better friend to others. And we were able to say how much we mattered to each other because we knew we didn’t have much time. Nothing went unsaid, nothing got put off “until next time.”

And because of that, I know that Leilah knew how much she meant to me, and I sure as hell know that she loved me. We expressed that in every conversation, every debate, every cup of tea or glass of wine. There was no room for doubt, and that is a huge comfort to me as I face my first holidays without her to share them with.

Here’s the thing, people: we’re all under a death sentence. We just don’t know when it’s going to be executed. The world we live in is not as stable or safe as we would wish—and we need to work on that. Part of that work, in my opinion, is never passing up an opportunity to express our affection in words and actions—to those close to us and those we meet on the way.

Treat everyone as though this might be the last time you see or talk with them. Be honest—be kindly honest, especially about how much you appreciate them. When you act like a jerk (come on—we all do), apologize as soon as you can bring yourself to do so. When they do something to piss you off, consider cutting them some slack; or, if you must call them on it, frame it in terms of the anomaly you know it to be. Leave a note, make a call, send an email, give a hug, pat a back, listen to a tale, share a cookie, say a prayer—whatever it is that strengthens the connections that bring joy to your life, do it.

Do not wait until you see a Paris-class catastrophe or get a phone call saying so-and-so was in a car crash to think, “But I didn’t get to say…” You still may not get to the Celtic knot hooked rug or the grand photo album with annotations and pithy remarks. But, in the end—soon or late—that won’t matter if you’ve created that tapestry of friendship one stitch at a time, making every moment count.

Trust me on this: you’ll be grateful you did.