Death is hard and painful and bitter. Death is a thief, and a teacher and a mystery. It steals the ones we love away from us, teaches us to value and appreciate the ones we have left and leaves us asking, the puzzling question 'why?'
Ironically, death reminds me of marriage. The wedding, preparations and all the crazy emotions do nothing to prepare you for the reality that is marriage. Nothing prepares you for the arguments you'll have, the traumas you'll face and the difficulties you'll have to bear together. Nothing prepares you for the sleepless nights and the problematic children. Nothing prepares you for the overwhelming love and hate you will feel for each other at various times. Nothing before your first night as husband and wife prepares you for life with that person.
With death, nothing prepares you for life without your loved one. The funeral, people's condolences and the outpouring of well wishes and prayers do nothing to prepare you for the reality that is death. Nothing prepares you for the emptiness you'll feel. Nothing prepares you for the nightmares, the tossing and turning at night. Nothing prepares you for the days and weeks after all the immediate emotions die. Nothing prepares you for the silence you'll get in return when you call out their name without thinking. Nothing prepares you for the dull permanent ache in your heart that you can't describe to anybody.
I lost my cousin last week. Before that terrible day, death had been far from me. I hadn't lost anybody close to me and so I never quite understood grief. I always cried when I found out that my friends lost someone close to them but nothing prepared me for the way I felt when I heard I had lost my beloved cousin. At first I felt bone chillingly cold. Then, I felt nothing. Absolutely nothing. I sat on my bed and after staring at the wall for what seemed like eternity, a muffled 'why' escaped from my lips. Why did my nineteen year old cousin have to die? Why did one of the few cousins on my maternal side that I truly love have to die? Why did God allow her to be born if he knew he was going to take her away just after nineteen short years? Why did God allow people to love her deeply and then allow death to rip her away from them?
After asking myself all those questions and more that I'm sure no human being alive can answer, I came to a startling conclusion. Death is hard and painful and bitter. Death is a thief, and a teacher and a mystery. But eerily like marriage, once the charade is over, we have to find a way to accept it and move on. Unlike marriage though, death is the end. The end of life as you knew it but the beginning of a new life. Both for you and the person you've lost. Losing someone you deeply love changes something at your core forever. I still haven't been able to cry for Temi yet but I know that very soon, like a couple settling into their marriage, the reality that I've lost someone I truly loved will hit me. And all I can pray for myself, is the strength to accept it then and keep her in my heart but move on. Death is the end but life, no matter how hard, painful or bitter it may be right now, isn't.
This is for you, Oluwagbotemi Braithwaite. I will always love you and I thank you for the precious but too few moments we shared together that were full of laughter and the warmth you radiated so beautifully. I don't know why you had to go but I thank you for the love you gave so effortlessly while you were with us. Right now, all I pray for is divine strength for your immediate family.
From your cousin and with all my love,
Dara Rhodes
