grief

Written By Bill Hulseman

weekly reflection, updates & good stuff 4.20.2021

Friends, 

On Monday, I used a poem by astronomer and poet Rebecca Elson, a text I’d stumbled across on Brain Pickings a few months ago. Maria Popova, the unparalleled mind behind the blog, has a particular gift for identifying forgotten and obscured texts and juxtaposing them, putting them in dialogue with each other and illuminating something in the present moment. In the past year of (don’t say it...don’t say it...there’s no other word…ugh...) unprecedented collective loss and trauma, I’ve been staying close to her reflections to process and make sense of it all. Now, over a year since a global pandemic engulfed our world in chaos and uncertainty, about a year since the daily numbers of deaths started to spike and collect in mystifying numbers, we’re closer (but still, it feels, so far away) from the end of this collective, global trauma. 

A year ago, I suggested in an essay, “Reflecting, rethinking, reimagining,” that we have plenty of sources to look for guidance for how to navigate such widespread loss and how to respond when we get to the other side. Not the hero narratives, the monomyths about Beowulf and Rama and Odysseus and Xbalanque who emerged victorious from their struggles, their journeys through the dark night - the lived experience of groups that forged communities and survived, sometimes over generations or centuries. When they were confronted with existential threats, they adapted, they remembered, they told the stories to the next generation, and through all the loss and death, they embraced and continued to strive for life, for flourishing. 

For me, two groups come to mind: First, Jews, who have faced persecution and near elimination many times, in many places, and who adapted to be able to affirm life (every burst of l’chaim carries so much more than a toast - it carries history and memory). Many times, I’ve heard people describe Jewish rituals boiling down to the same basic recognition: They tried to kill us. We’re still here. Let’s eat. Second, queer folx. While the movement for equal rights began many decades before Stonewall, and while the impact of Stonewall included new visibility and access, the AIDS crisis of the 1980s forged a community, a meta-chosen family. Here was a group of people, too many of whom had already been rejected by their families, friends, and religious communities, who faced existential threat from a rapidly and mysteriously spreading virus and being ignored, if not purposely left out in the cold, by the government. Queer people rallied together, created safe spaces and neighborhoods, and spurred momentum for the fight for equal rights. “We can, we should look,” I wrote, “to the generation who survived the plague, those people who knew what it was to be ignored by your government, who knew profound and compounded loss, and who found each other and rebuilt their community.”

These exemplars give us a model for surviving and rebuilding, but not for grieving. Grief was a constant companion to me before the pandemic hit, and in the past year I’ve had a lot of time to think about why I’ve kept it at my side. It makes me vulnerable to weeping, as if on cue, but, ugly cryer that I am, I’m happy to have it in my reach, to give me a channel to process my shock, my outrage, and my pain. I also find my self comfortable talking about, even joking about death (thought it perplexes my husband mightily). I frequently refer to my funeral files, one folder with notes (really, outlines and directions) for my own funeral, others with the drafts and final iterations of my parents’ funerals and my sister’s memorial. It all began with my mother. Whenever we gave her gifts for Christmas or her birthday, just as soon as she said “thank you,” she had a felt-tip pen to write our names or initials on the bottom. “I don’t want you fighting over stuff when I’m gone,” she explained once. She took me to every wake in town, and she was thrilled when, as an altar server, I’d be pulled out of school to serve a funeral in our parish. Who needs to master arithmetic when you can manage the censer and lead a procession of mourners with a candle?

Her approach didn’t shield me from grief - but it helped me to embrace it. I’ve never forgotten the rhetorical question a professor posed in a course on Existentialism. Existential philosophers, he explained, grappled with the question, “At the moment of your death, what will you be able to say about your life?” Many of my classmates had never thought about life in such stark terms. I responded, quietly to myself, why do you have to wait ‘til the moment of death to think about that? Religious and cultural traditions vary in their approaches to death, but the common denominator is this: they approach death. They address it. They develop practices that make space for people to process the experience of life and to rearticulate the value of life. 

Elson’s poem, “Antidotes to Fear of Death,” answers the existentialist’s question with an astronomer’s imagination:

And sometime it’s enough
To lie down here on earth
Beside our long ancestral bones:

To walk across the cobble fields
Of our discarded skulls,
Each like a treasure, like a chrysalis,
Thinking: whatever left these husks
Flew off on bright wings.

To me, she gives us a couple of options: to keep our gaze down, toward the “cobble fields,” or to look up with wonder and imagine the bright wings that launched from our hearts. 

If your inbox is bursting at the seams, please feel free to unsubscribe. If you’re interested in updates on bill hulseman consulting or my own reflections on ritual, education, and dialogue, read on! 

UPCOMING

UPDATES

Last week, the Madonna symposium with the Tacoma Arts Live Adult Conservatory launched! This group of (if not now, soon to be) Madonna Wannabes started with a dive into Madonna Studies - which is a thing! From Madonna’s early days the 1980s through the mid-to-late 1990s, academic journals and conferences saw a burst of interest in Madonna from a variety of angles. Theologians, anthropologists, critical theorists, philosophers, feminist theorists, musicologists - some applied their various theoretical lenses to make sense of Madonna, others saw her as the beacon of something new, a potential vehicle to illuminate emerging understandings of intersectionality, gender, and media. The best part of the session was not just watching Madonna’s groundbreaking (and at the time, so controversial she lost a deal with Pepsi) “Like a Prayer” video with the group or deconstructing it, sharing the history and symbolism in Christian mysticism that intersects with modern American racism. The best part was hearing from members of the group nuances and interpretations of the video that I haven’t encountered (in the 4,932,612 times that I’ve watched it...oh, now it’s 4,932,613) and the discussion that emerged assessing the video’s relevance in 2021. In the coming weeks, we’ll follow a few threads in Madonna’s oeuvre (yes, I just used the word “oeuvre”) - Madonna as Social Commentator, as Cultural Parasite, as Reinventor, and as Catalyst of Postmodernism. Sounds fun, doesn’t it? I’m offering another Madonna symposium starting August 12! One more Madonna update: I started my first playlist on theYouTube. It’s all Madonna, but what else would you want to watch on YouTube? 

I mentioned last week that I’m participating in Cat Dillon’s Routines & Rituals Symposium, a free online event running from April 26-May 8. 

Have you been feeling stuck + unmotivated?  Perhaps scattered + anxious?
The disruptions caused by the pandemic have dramatically altered our normal routines. That lack of structure has intensified many difficult feelings, and has made it much harder for everyone to cope with stress.
Routines and rituals help improve our resilience to stress, and lead to improved mental health, habits, focus, and productivity.  They also help us clearly see the source of our struggles and triggers.
But while routine is important, we still crave flexibility! How do we motivate ourselves to stick with a routine while not putting additional pressure on ourselves??
Are you curious about how you can use your body, mind, and soul to bring clarity to your vision of what is possible for your life?
I have joined forces with Cat Dillon, a Registered Holistic Nutritionist and Transformational Behavioral Coach, along with 21 other practitioners who are committed to helping others add depth and dimension to their lives in a free summit called: The Routines & Rituals Symposium.
Click Here To Reserve Your Spot On This FREE Series Now!
We’ll tell you exactly:
How rituals regulate your nervous system + synchronize your mind and body.
How to create mindful rituals + sacred spaces around food using sound.
How to craft routines + rituals to serve your relationships.
How to use rituals to create meaning around everyday tasks.
How rituals can end the harsh judgement + confusion about who we really are.
If you want transformation - to feel, do, and be better - simply follow the link below to reserve your spot before they’re gone.
Register here for this inspirational and educational FREE symposium. Take the first step to calm your senses, lower anxiety, improve your mood, and relieve your daily stress.
To your future!

I hope you’ll join me in exploring these questions and hearing Cat’s conversations with a wide range of experts and practitioners, Click here to register today!

Guided meditations via Zoom continue on Mondays at 4:00pm PST and on Thursdays at 9:00am PST! These morning (on the West Coast)/mid-day (on the East Coast)/evening (wherever else you might be) sessions will be just like the Monday session - our aim is to practice being present and finding a little peace and quiet. If you or someone you know could use a 20-30 minute dose of peace and quiet on Mondays or Thursdays, visit the meditation page on my site to sign up! 

Registration for the Good Stuff IV and Religion in film: a case study in religion and pop culture symposia is open! What, exactly, is a symposium? It’s a chance for a group of people to connect, experience something, and engage in meaningful conversation. Check out my website for more information and to sign up. Interested? More info and registration are here. Symposia are limited to 10 participants and need 4 to run - if you’ve thought about participating, now is the time to sign up! 

GOOD STUFF

Listen
When I joined the Boston Gay Men’s Chorus in 1999, our first rehearsal for the season included a surprise for the newbies. At the end of the night, all the new members were herded to the front of the room. Instead of some sort of crude hazing, our initiation into the group was complete with a lullaby, Fred Small’s “Everything Possible.” As we newbies found ourselves suddenly surrounded by and the focus of attention for 150+ strangers, I noticed guys moving closer together, grabbing each other’s hands and linking arms. Our director explained that this is how the chorus welcomed new singers, with a song that captured all of the hopes and dreams they had for each of us. Over the next 10 years, I was one of the guys who moved closer to the people who welcomed me into the chorus, who mentored me as a singer and as a young gay man. It was always a beautiful, sacred moment. By the time we got to the end of the first refrain, I was welling up, if not in a full-blown weep. I still (including now, as I’m writing this) weep when I listen. 

You can be anybody you want to be, 
You can love whomever you will
You can travel any country where your heart leads
And know I will love you still
You can live by yourself, you can gather friends around, 
You can choose one special one
And the only measure of your words and your deeds
Will be the love you leave behind when you’re done

If you stream music on Spotify, I’ve started a playlist called “Bill’s Good Stuff,” including music I’ve loved for a long time as well as things I’ve come across more recently. Feel free to add the playlist to your favorites! Bill’s Good Stuff Spotify Playlist

Read

For this week’s meditation, I used a poem by astronomer and poet Rebecca Elson. “Antidotes to Fear of Death” was the last poem she published before she died at the age of 39 in 1999.

“Antidotes to Fear of Death”
Rebecca Elson

Sometimes as an antidote
To fear of death,
I eat the stars.

Those nights, lying on my back,
I suck them from the quenching dark
Til they are all, all inside me,
Pepper hot and sharp.

Sometimes, instead, I stir myself
Into a universe still young,
Still warm as blood:

No outer space, just space,
The light of all the not yet stars
Drifting like a bright mist,
And all of us, and everything
Already there
But unconstrained by form.

And sometime it’s enough
To lie down here on earth
Beside our long ancestral bones:

To walk across the cobble fields
Of our discarded skulls,
Each like a treasure, like a chrysalis,
Thinking: whatever left these husks
Flew off on bright wings.

Bill Hulseman
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