My first phone was cordless, still a novelty back in 1999. I bought it for my first apartment at Walmart for probably something like $20. It was an AT&T phone.
Back then, four years out of high school, I still talked on the phone. Like real person-to-person conversations; there was no Discord or Facebook messenger to be had. I kept in touch with my high school buddies, who were scattered around northern Indiana at various colleges.
Brian, my best friend the last years of high school, attended a Christian college about two hours away. I went to a community college near home. We did discover keeping in touch through the internet; we both had email accounts (also still a novelty back then) through our schools, and we figured out how to communicate live (don't remember what we were using; it was some kind of computer-to-computer connection) – but we could only do that when I was logged on in the computer lab on campus. I never had internet service in that first apartment.
So we still talked on the phone on occasion. One day he called me up from school with big news about Sid, one of our high school set.
“Hey, did you hear about Sid?”
“No. What?”
“His dad died.”
“No way.” I couldn't believe it. I felt a nervous clutch in my gut. And I laughed.
I'm not sure I even realized I was laughing as we talked about what had happened (Sid's dad died of cancer), until Brian pointed it out. I knew his dad; Sid's house was where the senior football players went on Friday nights between the end of class and the game. I remember him as a nice, kind older dad, just sitting back and quietly enjoying our antics. Certainly I wasn't glad that he had died, and I can write off my laughter as some kind of nervous release; I can attribute it to not knowing exactly the right way to respond.
While that's true, at the same time it is too easy and cliché. By 1999 it had been a couple years since I had spoken to Sid, and even longer since I had seen his dad. I had a safe distance from that death, and at the same time it was bizarre and (dare I say it) wondrous to know someone who had lost a parent. That had never happened before. I think in part my laughter was just an expression of marvel at the newness of that experience.
And, talking about it on the phone, sitting alone on the floor of my apartment, listening to Brian share the big news about Sid – in a way we were gossiping about our friend more than anything, or at least I though we were. I doubt I would have had that reaction if I had been face-to-face with someone when I heard about it.
I sombered up as soon as Brian pointed out that I was laughing. Immediately switched to the appropriate platitudes and sadness. And I felt horrible about laughing. Brian asked me if I was going to attend the funeral, but I couldn't imagine doing that. If I reacted so horribly to just hearing the news, how could I face Sid? What would I say?
It had been a few years since I had spoken to Sid, as I said, but I decided right then that I wasn't going to see him; I had to avoid saying or doing the wrong thing at all cost. I never did see him or talk to him after his dad died.
It took me decades to get over that fear of saying or doing the wrong thing around a person who is grieving. Eventually, in a new state two thousand miles from Indiana and with an entirely new set of friends, I was able to be there for a friend who lost his mother, and of course there is no 'right' thing to say or do at that time. The platitudes and condolences are just a ritual to cover the fact that there is nothing that can be said or done.
The important thing (the only thing) is just to be there, and that's relatively easy to do.
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On Joining the Silver Bloggers
I have for years resisted jumping into this community, out of sheer denial that I belonged.
Well, in two months I turn 50. I can't deny that I'm qualified any longer. :)