Letter to Carolyn

There is no way I could begin to tell you all the thoughts and feelings that have swirled through my mind since I received a phone call one evening last December telling me that you had died. Sattva, my Buddhist online friend whom I met in the E-Sangha, suggested that I could still talk to you and write you letters even though you're dead. It seems like a good idea, but with limitations. You can't answer back. One of our UU ministers said that death is like a disease that renders one unable to respond, or even listen. I am sad that you came down with this disease.

At the UU Fellowship in Auburn, your flower-draped casket occupied the same space where you and I stood, along with other members of your wedding party, almost twenty years before on the day of your marriage. I was in my frilly blue bridesmaid dress and you wore a cascade of white taffeta and chiffon. You were radiant on that warm sunny June afternoon, without a trace of the undercurrent of dark depression that surfaced from time to time, fracturing your fragile inner world. Still, I never dreamed that you would someday become completely engulfed in a darkness so black that you believed the sun would never shine again.

Your funeral, on that cold December day, was a blur of fragrant pastel floral arrangements, classical music pieces you loved streaming softly from the piano, your friend Tom reciting a poem he had written for you, and a Christian scripture being read from a leather-bound Bible. In a fog I heard someone playing a bluegrass tune on a mandolin, the UU minister speaking at the podium, and Uncle Jim and Aunt Gale singing “Spirit of Life” from their second row seats behind me. Through a haze I could see the your photographs, both as a girl and as a woman, that I had placed carefully on the altar table on either side of the chalice.

When the sleek white hearse backed up to the church, to carry you on your final journey here on earth, it seemed unreal, like a scene from a sad movie. Was all this really happening around me? Jack and I were instructed to pull our vehicle in line for the cemetery procession. I rolled down the window on the passenger side. Your friends from the library leaned in, hugging me one after another, all offering comforting words. Were you watching from above, or from some other place? Were you watching at all, or are you just simply gone now? I can’t quite wrap my mind around the concept of your death. None of it seems to make sense.

I have never lived on this earth without a sister. You have always been there, throughout my entire life, as you were the firstborn. Now I’ve entered a new phase, where you are no longer a part of my life. Who will be my sister now? Herman Hesse wrote that the gift of despair makes it possible for us to start a new life. Sadly and relucantly, I am starting over without you. Losing you makes me think about reorganizing my priorities and values. Should I do something different? Should I quit my job and go live for awhile in an ashram in India? The idea has potential. Our parents are dead, and I have no other siblings. I have few family members left to keep me rooted in the South. I have Jack, and he would gladly travel with me.

Silver strands have started appearing all throughout my hair. You and I will never be little old ladies together in our golden years, and that makes me sad. I am also sad that you didn't live to enjoy your retirement, after 25 years at the library. It was a fabulous season for azaleas this year. Our front lawn was awash in lavender, deep pink, and pure white blossoms for most of February, like a scene from a watercolor painting. I sure wish you had been here to see it.