Maybe it’s a natural byproduct of the narrowing gap between myself and the big Four-O — which is, given present life expectancy, the age at which it becomes virtually impossible to deny that fully half of your life is actually over, and yes you did just hear my voice shake in terror as I said that — but I’ve been meditating on change and the passing of time quite a bit lately. Okay, more like brooding about it really. About how what we want and will about our lives and everything and everyone in it seems to bear so little actual weight in the end, each of us apparently having about as much real power over the grand narrative arc of space-time as a shadow has over the ground it falls upon. And while it’s true that I have enough sense to know that none of us should want to suppress the changes that bless and befall us — everything having as it does a season and a time and a purpose, turn turn turn — being as I am in possession of nothing but flawed human judgment and my own subjectivity, I of course still do. I still want to press my will into time, and have it leave an imprint there.
And so I’m brought to this photo I took a couple of years back of my daughter M with Mr. Moo, amiable pet of a neighborhood restaurant owner. Mr. Moo was a fixture along our hood’s Main Street, a tenderly anthropomorphised friend to all who crossed his path. Year after year, all spring and summer long, Moo would sunbathe on the steps of his owner’s restaurant, squinting demurely at passersby as if daring them to resist stroking his deliciously fluffy white belly. Few resisted. And M adored him.
I’m guessing that you know where this story is going.
Last summer we stopped seeing Mr. Moo around his usual haunts. M inquired after him endlessly — what had happened to him, where was he, did he move? — and though I knew the answers to her questions as surely as you do reading this now, I finally cornered Moo’s owner and asked her point blank what had happened to him. He’d died, of course. Of old age, and happily, if it matters. To me it didn’t.
The point is, I still haven’t told M about this. In fact, I’ve lied outright about it. As far as my daughter is concerned Mr. Moo now lives on a distant farm — yes yes, that ridiculous old cliche — and I’ve made his pastoral life sound so glorious and appealing that she often asks to visit him there. At which point my chest tightens, and I quickly change the subject.
But I don’t feel bad about the lie, about shielding her from confronting in a very concrete and personal way the sad reality that everything and everyone she cares about has an expiration date. An unknown expiration date, sure, but an expiration date nonetheless. No, I can’t bring myself to feel guilty for hiding from her the truth that — whether by some manner of estrangement or, ultimately, death — even the strongest attachments of the heart invariably end in grief, that every connection foreshadows separation, and that despite the certainty of this all her life she’ll pursue these fleeting bonds that will rend her with a doggedness insensible to reason, ceaselessly imploring this world, as we all do, to break her heart.
Oh no. Sorry. It's awful.
Did you start to cry when you typed '…to break her heart.'?
The farm thing…cliche but classic. I had a dog that went to *live* on a farm, I just turned 40 this past year and I still don't beleive it!
-Marla http://www.avapidblonde.com
Not sure what all that gobaldygook is up there as to who I am
Gulp. If I had any Xanax, I would take one right now. The thought of my children suffering heartbreak sends me into complete panic.
We have 2 cats, and a 2 year-old. Both cats are significantly older than my kid (one of them by more than a decade). I know that at some point, when my daughter is older and even more aware of their presence than she already is, the cats are eventually going to die, and it's going to shatter her little baby heart. Thinking about this inevitability makes me want to cry. When the time comes, I may use the "went to live on a farm" story too. It just seems kinder for everyone.
Death is hard no matter what the age.
I ran out of jokes earlier today. Now I'm also out of witty. You get:
Yeah.
My god you can write. I've always meant to tell you how much I've enjoyed reading some of your more serious posts. You write about heavy subjects so, so perfectly, and with such an elegant style.
Thank you for putting words to what so many of us feel. This is truly lovely. Welcome back (not that you were ever really gone-gone)
Oh, this was oh so heartbreaking. Maybe that's my own little depression piping up…but man. Life's a bitch, ain't it?
I really dread dealing with this with my girls. Somehow I haven't had to do it yet and I'm sort of fine with that because just thinking about it makes me hyperventilate and get a little teary-eyed.
Given your tweet I am commenting to say I always read (well, new reader buta lways since I started) but rarely comment because (1) your writing is so good I feel lame, and (2) I am a young-ish new mom (26) and I am fear sounding like the young, clueless parent I often am.
That said, wonderful post. Your cat is probably chasing my hamster Elvis on that farm, right?
You're totally right to not tell her. There's honesty and then there's brutal honesty. Death can be saved for later.
And Marieka is right…you rocked that shit.
We have a great book that broaches this subject, I bought it because my oldest cat is 16 and I'm afraid we'll need it one of these days: Desser, The Best Cat Ever. Bob and I bawl our eyes out whenever Roo requests it but Roo is very pragmatic about death and says "oh, Desser was a great cat! And they'll have a kitten now." Kids move on faster than we do, I think.
hmm. We had a neighborhood hood cat who has also gone missing. He may actually be on a farm in Brittany, but he might also have gone to sleep under the flowers (I must ask my neighbor).
My kids haven't yet asked where Babar the cat has gone, but I think, since my kids are older, I'll tell them the Brutal Truth. I think they're old enough to start being told this.
Rarely comment either, but your post was so powerful that it pulled me right out of Google Reader…
My daughter was introduced to the concept of death by a cat- specifically, the grasshopper, the chipmunk and the assorted birds murdered by our families third cat- a half wild 1 year old beastie. My mother in law was over to visit and when the cat brought us a "gift" (I maintain that these are threats, not gifts) mother in law told my daughter that the gifts were dead. I wasn't ready for my kid to say 'hopper dead' in her sweet 18 month old voice, and I am not ready for her to know the concept at 2. I hate to think that she will REALLY understand that one day, my oldest cat will die, will not return anymore. It would break my heart for that cat to go, I think it would kill me to see my kid that sad too. You nailed it.
My kid knows about death from three deaths we have had in our family in the last year. She periodically freaks out about death. It is interesting because I am not particularly afraid of my own death–although of course, I am afraid of it right now for fear of leaving my child without a mother. So I try to explain to her that death doesn't have to be scary and that I am not afraid to die. This does not reassure her, really.
This might freak some people out but she embraced her grandfather on his deathbed. She was there when he was dying. This did not upset her though. In a way, she really did accept his death. It is more her death that she can't handle. And also ours.
I think I have the wrong mother instincts. My approach to life is to try to steel myself for the worst. So I always think that it is better to let my kid know about bad things. Not that I tell her if she doesn't ask! But I usually explain bad things if she wants to know about them. I am always trying to accept that bad things happen. (I am actually bad at this.) But of course, she is only five and how can she do this? I am probably doing the wrong thing. It's hard to know what to do. It's not like I can conceal the fact her grandfather died. I always hope that if we show her we can handle things like death then she will grow up thinking that she can. It's just one of those many things I do as a reaction to my own upbringing.
Also, I teach young people and one thing that surprises me is that they are very afraid of thinking about anything bad and have an aversion to the truth, if the truth is not pleasant. They very adamantly tell me that they prefer a lie if it makes their life more pleasant or if the truth is upsetting. I might also be reacting to this…in some unconscious way. If she asks me about something and I know she won't like the answer, I often tell her the truth and I wonder if that is because I am worried she will grow up to be like these kids I teach. (The ones who are not American actually don't approach life this way. It really is cultural, I think.)
Still, I DO lie to her though and tell her that there is NO WAY that her parents will die for a veryveryveryveryveryvery long time, when I know that is not necessarily true. But the truth is too complicated and anxiety-producing with that one.
I don't blame you for shielding her from some harsher realities. I remember the first time that I faced the death of my first furry love, and it shook my whole body for longer than I had ever imagined.
Is it strange that I feel weepy for Mr. Moo, too?
Man, now I wish that I'd paid you the compliment sooner! You've written many posts that really blew me away.
I can't stand cats, yet something about that picture makes me feel like adopting one, assuming I can find one as nice as Mr. Moo looks like he was.
My three year old just lost his favorite aunt, so we're dealing with this right whole death thing now. My wife and I haven't come up with anything better than telling him that she's not sick anymore (long cancer battle) and is up in the sky. Ugh.
We're moving and can't take our cats with us. One is inbred and a complete schizo and no one would ever want her. She doesn't get along with human or animal. So, we're putting her down. To our kids thought, we're "giving her away." I would have told them the truth, but DH already told the lie. The kids refer to her as the mean cat and don't like her, so really, I thought the truth would suffice.