how the dying goes
I am the granddaughter of a southern Baptist minister. I should really get into genealogy like lots of folks do and learn more about my family history, the other side of my line—my father's side. They all do that like for fun. They clip obituaries and save them in little shoe boxes. They know stuff. I only have the memories that roll around in my head. Today I had to write his obituary. He died last night, mostly alone. Mostly not in the good goodest graces of his family because, well, he was kind of mean. But I wrote it because my mother loved him, and she would have wanted me to do this.
I loved him too, but things be complicated. When I was a little girl, my grandfather would look me in the eye and tell me about heaven. He would then tell me about hell. To be honest, they both sounded scary. On and on and forever and ever, and it was, I think, the origins of my anxiety and rage. I would lay in my twin bed and scroll through a flickering motion picture of forever, and it was too much for my mind to take. I was walking down a road that went on forever, and I was always alone. Even now as I think about death in my bed at night, I have this imagery inside of one of the hallways of my mind that has a door with a plaque called religion.
