Two Important Things Our Ancestors Knew About Community

I try not to get too serious on my blog or to take myself too seriously. On occasion I'll make an exception. This time is one of them.

Our ancestors knew a thing or two about life and community.  They knew what it took to raise up kids, get through life and enter into the twilight with dignity.

My sense is that people these days are losing their understanding of why doing certain things is important.

Over the past year I have lost five friends and family members. The most recent being my mother earlier this month. Quite a banner year for someone who has never really had to deal with death.

The experience has taught me two important lessons that our ancestors knew about services and community gatherings. I hope you'll consider these points when the time comes for you to handle major life events.

1) Shared Community Events are Important

After my mother's service, my cousin told me something along the lines of "Coming together like this makes me realize how important it is for family to be together and stay connected." She is so right. I had the same reaction. In this frantic world that we live in it is so easy to get wrapped up in our own worlds and push our greater community of family, friends and neighbors aside.

Our ancestors knew that community events were important. They knew that community events created a bond that gave support to all the members involved. Marriages before the community publicly announced to the couple that they were not alone. Their family and friends and community would be there to help them get through the rough patches. Smaller events like baby showers, birthdays and anniversaries likewise further strengthened the ties of support and witness to life events. And so it is with funerals, that a community, no matter how large or small, comes together to provide support to those left behind. Our ancestors knew that with this support we could together make it through this journey of life.

Maybe there is something that we've forgotten as a society that we should revisit. Maybe we need to put more effort into creating ties and building the bridges that will strengthen and enrich our lives and encourage us in hard times.

2) Saying Goodbye as a Family or Community is Important

My mother died from complications due to Alzheimer's disease. When that happens, the one who passes has lost a connection with a social community often for many years except for select immediate family. Sometimes we are tempted not to hold a public service as a result. No matter what the situation at the end of life it is important to hold a service and allow family and friends and those who want to support us to attend.

Saying goodbye is really important. That one brief act will provide the closure you need to grieve and allow you to move on with the rest of your life. Those who opt not to attend a service, or not to have a service, are preventing the much needed chance to release those emotions no matter how complicated those emotions might be.  A one hour service gives you the freedom of the rest of your life. Denying the need to say goodbye will hold you captive for a long, long time.

I say this because I didn't think I needed to attend my Mom's service. That I was fine on my own.  I was wrong. Our ancestors knew how critical is was to say goodbye and to allow yourself to receive the support of others.

So the next time you pass on the chance to say goodbye to someone because the kids are sick, or you're busy at work or you don't like to fly, think again.  Work will understand, bring the kids along and make it a road trip if you have to. Your life will be strengthened by the decision.

Comments

  1. I hope you had an opportunity to say goodbye in another way - at another time. If you didn't I hope you'll make sure you do. You're right, it is very important! Please look after yourself Marian.

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  2. I am so sorry to hear that you lost your mother this month. It doesn't matter the ailment or affliction there's a special bond with family and the communities that we are involved in: genealogy community, quilting community, school...etc. That's why we feel the connection even 100 or 200 years later. There's an imprint. And I agree with your cousin!

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  3. Great post. Not only strait gut from the heart, but so very true. My own mother died aged 62 after a 20 year struggle with Alzheimer's disease. My sisters and I had the same reaction as you did .. That she had lost contact with people and that a private service was appropriate but we changed our minds and so many people turned up to honor her, to support our family and to celebrate her life. When my father passed away a few years later, I decided to take a leaf from my Irish ancestors.... and as my Dad was a musician we had a full musical tribute to him with an orchestra, jazz band and his grandchildren playing music. You are so right in saying that our ancestors knew the importance of family and community celebrations. We all need to elaborate life and family more! Thank you for your meaningful post. It has made me think!

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  4. I am very sorry for your loss, also, and you have said so beautifully why these events are important to do, important to hold. We have lost many family members in the past ten years, and I would add one more thing to your post, it is a good time, and perhaps the last time, to honor the accomplishments of that person, the life they've lived, the impact they've had on us all, and in so doing, allow us an opportunity to grieve. Thank you, Marian.

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  5. Nice, heartfelt post, Marian. I agree with everything you say. A funeral is like the final punctuation mark at the end of a life. Hard for the reader to move on from a sentence with no period, and hard for loved ones to move on from a life/death with no funeral. I'm glad you drew comfort from it.

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  6. Lorine and everyone, I should clarify that I did go to the service. I didn't think I needed to but in the end my wise husband convinced me that not only I, but the whole family, needed to go. I don't think I would have been able to come to these realizations without having attended.

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  7. Thank you for sharing, Marian. Your mom raised a really neat woman.

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  8. No truer words have been spoken. It amazing how the passing of a loved one can teach us so much about life and ourselves. I think you will find as you continue through the grieving process your Mother will still be teaching you. Thank You for sharing Marian.

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  9. Marian,

    I'm sorry to hear of your loss.
    May your mother rest in peace.

    If there's anything we all need, it's family and community.
    Family and community are held together by our hellos and goodbyes. Love, respect, happiness, and hard times fill up the center.

    You take care.

    Peace & Blessings,
    "Guided by the Ancestors"

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  10. We should share the originality & uniqueness that once was someone that loved, and was loved by all. I've come across that expression of feelings many times in my cemetery travels. Invariably, though, they always seem to be from another time in our society. We have become not only desensitized to death, but to life. In the end, for one and all, it is important to take a moment to not only remember that they lived, but to remember that you are alive.
    So sorry for your loss Marian.

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  11. Yes. I come from a family that has recently not held services and I think we loss something by it. I know that I have.

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  12. Oh, Marian, what a hard year for you. I know that in a sense you lost your mom when Alzheimer's took over her body and brain, but in a bigger sense you really lost her when she passed. And I'm sorry for your loss, for both of them. This post was right on target when it comes to community, family, and farewells.

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  13. I'm sorry to hear about your losses, Marian, and you are so right about community support. When my mother died, we knew her wish was for a private family-only funeral. I've always felt bad about those who wanted to attend and were excluded from saying goodbye.

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  14. What an important and heartfelt post, and I am so sorry for your loss. What you have said is so very true, and this sense of community was a huge part of what we spoke about at my mother-in-law's funeral just a little over a week ago. Despite below zero temps, many people showed up to help us to honor her life. At almost 90, many of her friends have gone before her, but the small town that she had lived in for the past 66 years were there. While it was a stroke that was the final straw, she had been living in a nursing home for the past 3 1/2 years because of vascular dementia. Many years of high blood pressure had taken its toll. Because of the lack of short term memory, we didn't know till that day how many people had faithfully visited her each week. It was a wonderful way to say goodbye.

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  15. Marian, I am so sorry for your loss, and I heartily agree with your sentiments. My mother died two years ago and didn't want a service. She was living 2000 miles from where she had lived for 75 of her 90 years, and felt she didn't know anyone. So we respected her wishes and didn't have anything where she was living. But when we took her ashes back to her beloved California, we made it a "road trip" which included a wedding and a drive down the California coast to all the places she loved. It was a perfect way to say good-bye, culminating in the interment of her ashes alongside my stepdad's and a graveside service that I am sure she would have approved of -- and she'd have been amazed and delighted at the people who attended.

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  16. Marian, I've been thinking of you and happy to read that your journey through this time is NOT ALONE. It was also good to read that you found the error of your thinking in time to really take advantage of what grieving with friends and family will do for you. When my Dad passed, my Mom refused to attend the viewing, so my siblings and I were in charge. I found it the MOST positive aspect of that difficult time. I believe I actually sucked the strength out of folks when they shook my hand or hugged me. I believe my Mom missed receiving that strength and grieved alone too long. If I can possibly do it, I try to attend viewings of my friend's parents/children so that the "strength" can be sucked out of me, too.

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  17. I am sitting here trying to find the right words to put in the comment box. Too many things running through mind after reading your post and the other comments. All I can really say is thank you for sharing in the way you do and sorry for your loss.

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  18. Marian,

    Your post is very touching.

    I went through a similar experience two years ago, when I lost my father, brother and aunt. We had other losses that year, as well. I am just beginning to feel like myself again. I was able to say good-bye and I am grateful to have had that opportunity. However, like all traumas in life, it takes a good deal of time to process the death of a loved one. The preson who said "time heals all," knew a good deal about the human spirit.

    Thank-you for sharing your thoughts with us.

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  19. Marian, I accidentally found this post while I was looking for something else in your blog. Now that I see the title, it reminds me that I had seen it mentioned via another blog in my blogger dashboard. Because our family was then going through a lot of turmoil of our own, I had made a mental note to revisit. Of course, Murphy must have intervened and I never could find that link again. Glad I stumbled upon it today.

    You have documented a very important concept, and I really appreciate the way you chose to express it. I know it must be a hard time for you--perhaps I had so much trouble "finding" your post because I had just gone through a difficult family loss, myself, and so totally relate--and I am sorry for your loss.

    I am so appreciative, though, of the fact that the community was indeed there to lift you up and allow you a safe place to grieve among loved ones. One thing I remember from family deaths of decades past was those friends who had that talent of coming to visit and somehow turning that black-darkness of mourning into the uplifting appreciation of good memories. Those "remember when" talents of some old family friends--close enough to know our loved one well, but removed enough from the situation to not be overwhelmed by it--were such a gift. A gift, unfortunately, that I'm afraid may be becoming a lost art as people shy away from these difficult life passages.

    Your words are a vital reminder that we need to "be there" and *not* shy away from these times to lift each other up!

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  20. Great post. Not only strait gut from the heart, but so very true. My own mother died aged 62 after a 20 year struggle with Alzheimer's disease. My sisters and I had the same reaction as you did .. That she had lost contact with people and that a private service was appropriate but we changed our minds and so many people turned up to honor her, to support our family and to celebrate her life. When my father passed away a few years later, I decided to take a leaf from my Irish ancestors.... and as my Dad was a musician we had a full musical tribute to him with an orchestra, jazz band and his grandchildren playing music. You are so right in saying that our ancestors knew the importance of family and community celebrations. We all need to elaborate life and family more! Thank you for your meaningful post. It has made me think!

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