A few thoughts on loss

It’s been awhile since my last post here. A lot has been in motion, including a fun family jaunt to NYC, and a couple not-so-fun stomach bugs. I’ve had a post drafted for a few weeks and it keeps changing, but the goal of this whole thing is to keep putting writing out there, so here goes.

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Back at the beginning of April, Vero and I participated in the annual Empty Arms Bereavement Support “Syrup Stampede” 5K. Empty Arms supports people who have lost children through miscarriage, stillbirth, early infant death, or termination for medical reasons. As many of you know, we lost our own little girl – Alana Rafael – to stillbirth in between our two sons Joshua and Avi, and Empty Arms’ groups and resources were really supportive during that time.

From my April 2023 Notebooks:

STILL LIFE

Poetry is like a grave
That dies again so it

May live.
Forever, our daughter

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And a few weeks ago I watched a film by an old college classmate of mine, Molly Gandour, about her process grieving the death of her sister Aimee, from leukemia, during childhood, and going to family therapy later, with her parents.

The film itself is the excavation of these memories, a making sense of, re-touching the event, which takes place through interviews, journal entries, drawings, home videos. It’s beautiful. You watch the full thing here.

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I think often about how an inability to process grief and fear – grief at personal loss, or societal calamity (slavery, climate change); fear of change, death – is part of what creates susceptibilities to right-wing mythologies. That grief and fear, untouched, may metastasize into rage and blame…where we look for a simple explanation, often in the form of an other, to project our insecurities onto. “Immigrants are to blame for my grief about a world that is changing too fast, and from which I feel I am being left behind.”

I am reminded, as a parent, of bypassing my child’s own pain to attempt to quickly “make it better.”

I am most successful when I simply get down to his level, accompany him, and be present.

Like the bunny in this lovely children’s book.

If I actually slow myself down, he is likely to move on more quickly. These moments can quickly morph into giggling. The energy takes its leave.

If we make space for the feeling, a lot is actually possible.

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We might, on the left, need to get better at this, around democracy and the state of our movements – if we want to broaden our coalition in this moment, and actually win power to govern – rather than bypassing loss through intellectual or moral superiority (if we lose, at least I get to be right). How can we get better at holding space for grief, whether our own or that of possible allies who are not yet with us? There are a lot of moveable people out there in this moment.

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Finally, I’ve been trying, and failing, to find some words about my dear friend Sebastian Lasaosa Rogers, who died surfing on Rockaway Beach a couple weeks ago. Sebastian was a beautiful human being: warm, curious, fun-loving, kind, endlessly interested in other people, places, the world. You can see his work as a filmmaker and cinematographer here, including the trailer for his feature-length directorial debut, Freeing Juanita (which feels even more timely in this moment of unconstitutional U.S. government abductions, detentions, and deportations). It will be watchable here for its U.S. premiere on June 1st.

Here’s a picture that my sister dug up of the two of us as kids (with his mother Rosa).

And a more recent one, from my phone:

Have a lovely week, everyone. Take care of your loved ones.

-Adam