Mirror Synchronicity: Girls and what to write about?

I had just finished writing a guest blog piece about Dreamy Smurf's bucket list.  In the Smurf's Village game on the IPad, Dreamy Smurf teaches another smurf that a bucket list is a list of things you want to do before you die.  I was particularly proud of the essay because I wrote about death, but in a "fun" way.

If reading about death can ever be fun.

My husband tried to level-set with me.  "You're the only one who is interested in this.  No one wants to read about death."  Hurt, I stomped upstairs to go watch television in bed.

I turned to Girls, one of my new favorite HBO shows, written by Lena Dunham.  Her character is a writer who feels that no one "gets" her.

In episode 9, the character Hannah (played by Lena) is explaining her latest essay to her co-worker about an ex boyfriend who was a hoarder.  Then her co-worker starts to give her a hard time about her writing.

Imagine my surprise when I was watching episode 9 and this dialogue occurs:

Ray:  What in the world could be more trivial than intimacy?  Hmmm? Is there anything real you can write about?


Hannah:  What do you think would be a real thing to write about?


Ray:  I don't know, lot's of things.  Cultural criticism.  How about years of neglected abuse?  How about acid rain? How about the plight of the giant Panda Bear.  How about racial profiling?  How about urban sprawl?  How about divorce?  How about DEATH?  How about death?  Death is the most fucking real.  You should write about death.  That's what you should write about, explore that.  Death.

Of course I started screaming for my husband to come upstairs to watch the clip as if it were some validation that I was right.

Mirror Synchronicity: Worst Ways to Die

Those who don't believe in synchronicities will surely scoff at this one.  I have a history of being led to  books.  I have written about synchronicities more than once, here, here, and also a synchronicity story I wrote about in my book that I never posted.

I felt directed to Half Price Books, although I wasn't sure why.  There was no book I had in mind except for maybe something related to the Death Cafe.

I was just about to leave the store, figuring my hunch was wrong, when I turned around and found three copies of this book for only $3 each.

The reason I found it to be synchronous is because the Death Cafe was on my mind.  The art images that we printed on t-shirts to raise money for the Death Cafe event were all based on ideas of our worst fear of dying.  (Mine is crocodile, what's yours?)  Here are the images that we are putting on t-shirts:

I had never heard of this book before, but I thought they would be good to have on tables at the event as conversation starters.

Mirror Synchronicity: The Turkey Vulture

A few weeks ago, an animal unfortunately died in our garage. We thought we smelled something bad, but when the turkey vultures started hanging around our back deck, we knew for sure there must be a dead animal. My husband tore apart the garage, found the source of the smell, and relocated it to the woods.

Two weeks later, the smell is gone (at least to us) but the turkey vultures remain. There are two and I see them on the porch several times a day. If I think about it too much it makes me a little crazy. Is there something they know that we don't? Is it a sign that death is on the horizon? They really do feel quite ominous. (Not to mention they poop a lot on the deck and are annoying for that fact alone.)

Or is this a lighthearted synchronicity to acknowledge my work on the Death Cafe? Really the whole idea of the Death Cafe is to raise death awareness. How better to symbolically represent that than to have vultures standing around.

I took this picture of the turkey vulture today and then I got online to one of my social networks.  I had not yet posted anything about my new vulture friends, but one of my connections had linked to a blog that talked about crows and had a beautiful drawing of a turkey vulture. 

It remains to be seen whether there is more to this story regarding an actual death on the horizon.  Let's hope it is not anytime soon.

Directional Synchronicity: The Right Time

The more hospice experiences I have, the more sure I am that there is a significance and a plan to the timing of a patient's death.  I have written about timing before here.  Today I was on my way to sit bedside with a patient who was actively dying.  I will call him "Ed."  I was supposed to start at 8 am but I felt directed to get there a few minutes early.  Sure enough, when I walked back to the room, the whole family was there and they told me that he had just passed.

Ed's daughter, whom I will call "Melissa" apologized that I hadn't been notified in time so that I did not have to come.  I expressed my condolences and asked if she was there when he died.  She said, "Yes, and it was the strangest thing."  She pulled me out into the hallway and asked me if I had remembered the conversation we had two days prior.

Two days ago, she had asked me, "Is it true that when their feet turn blue, that is the sign that the time is near?  That is what the nurse said."  I smiled.  I know that at this time, when a loved one is dying, the words I say will be remembered.  I need to be extra thoughtful in my communication.  I also do not want to ever contradict another staff member.

I said, "Yes, it is true.  However..." and then I began to explain to her the spiritual side of things.  That the more that I have worked in hospice, the more I know that the timing is much more mysterious.  Sometimes the feet don't change.  Sometimes they do and the person doesn't die.  What I told her is that there is a plan, and it's something that we don't get to know until later.  I told her, "If you are meant to be there, you will be... but sometimes, no matter how much you love them, they would rather spare you of the moment."  I told her that it can be nearly impossible to predict which way the patient will want it, but after the fact, it will always seem clear that how it happened was the way it was supposed to happen.

Her eyes got big and she told me that her father in law had passed just minutes after they had left the room.  Her own experience confirmed for her what I was saying.  She thanked me for the conversation and went to work.

Fast forward to today.  This is what Melissa told me in the hallway.  Melissa had been thinking about what I had told her.  She decided to have a conversation with her dad, "Ed."  She told him lovingly, "Dad, you and I both know that I am the only one in the family who can handle being here when you go.  Everyone has said their goodbyes... I will look after them.  You need to go while it's on my shift."

Within just a couple of minutes, his breathing changed.  The nurse acknowledged that it would be soon.  Melissa called her family.  Knowing that they were on their way, he knew it was time.  Ed died within five minutes of his daughter telling him it was time to go.  She said he took three breaths and it was a peaceful transition.

So then after Melissa had told me the story, we both found significance in the fact that I had not been notified.   It was important to her to tell me the story, and it was helpful for me to hear it.

Directional Synchronicity: A Time to Grieve

I am an intern at a hospice. When I was going through orientation, my boss gave me a copy of this book, telling me that they give it to any staff who have lost a family member. I looked through the book and thought that it would be very helpful for someone experiencing loss. I decided to order an extra one on Amazon just to have it as a gift for anyone who had lost someone. I ordered it used because it was described to be in good condition. It was sent via media mail and took weeks to arrive. The day it arrived, I was opening the package when my husband received a phone call that his grandmother died. It arrived at just the right time and I ended up giving it to my husband's aunt who was grieving the loss of her mother.