The Afterdeath
IT WAS THE MIDDLE of March 2007, a month after my seven-year-old son had died at home from a bacterial infection we’d initially thought was just the flu. I was sitting on the living room couch, facing the fireplace and the charred logs from the night before. My husband, Matt, had left to drive our four-and-six-year-old sons to school. Outside, gray clouds stretched to the horizon. Maybe it would rain later. There was certainly no chance of sun.
My friend Rose sat next to me, our feet resting on the coffee table. As we talked, the stereo played a mix of songs that moaned in harmony with my mood: Ray LaMontagne asking, “Will I always feel this way?” in a tone that suggested the empty feeling would last forever. I clung to the sounds of melancholy because I wanted assurance that I wasn’t greedy in my continued estrangement from a functioning life. I hated the pain of grief, but I needed it. Without grief, I might return to who I used to be: happy and unhappy but smiling nonetheless; guilty and offended but apologizing either way; ambivalent or desiring but always agreeing.
When I look back at myself, I can still feel the leaden weight of questions that sank me deeper into the couch. If one finds value in sad songs, is there value in a sad life? What about a sad woman?
Rose grabbed a stuffed pillow that was slumped against the armrest of the couch and hugged it on her lap. Then she pointed to the stone mantle above
