To my dead friends and family

can you hear me, or see me naked?

My grandfather always insisted the dead can’t see the living. At least, that’s what he said back when he was alive and mean, a Southern Baptist minister who dismantled any need I had for religion. How could a supposedly benevolent God hate my cousin for being gay, or chastise me for living with a man I loved? His litany of judgment was exhausting. What did he even know? How could he know anything about being dead?

There are more distant losses, more tertiary ghosts, but this is the list that still stings. Is there some rule in death that your family can’t see you having sex or self‑sabotaging, and only friends get that access?
What do they know about me now?
I’m putting my foot down.

Here’s what you can see,
dearly departed:

GRANDPA TURN, 79, massive stroke
I remember your kindness, and you had bad hips and used two beat up canes because a walker wasn’t manly. You had a full head of thick hair still, and you were handsome in the way you can see underneath old people into their bone structure and imagine their eyes clear, so blue like a bird. Watch me and your son, my father. Peek at us on the telephone or in the diner on State Route 664, talking about my mother or your wife Mary Frances with toast in our mouths. Notice how your son has your same sadness as you. You’re also allowed to watch me on the beach, where I feel free.

JOSH, 21, boyfriend, motorcycle accident
We were just kids, but even after high school I’d go home on random weekends from college and, after a rowdy night at the Shamrock Bar on Main Street, walk to the old blue telephone booth with graffiti and call you to pick me up, and we’d hook up. Never mind if we had other loves; it was almost the equivalent of a cigarette in Paris, it doesn’t count. You can see me naked. It’s ok. I don’t look the same, yet I think you’d still like my tits.

GRANDMA TURN, 96, perfect health until kidney infection
My sweet friend who helped raise me, I miss you all the time with your wit and sharp mind, the actual definition of a photographic memory. It’s wild, why didn’t I get that genetic lottery. I miss your food and our talks and how you held the genealogy of our family, telling me stories of the wild women in our lineage. Please watch me in the grocery and while I cook, what you taught me. No dented cans. Pie crusts like this. How to Spatchcock a chicken. Skin a fish. I hope you see me using your kitchen bowls