Girl on a Gravestone
Today is the two year anniversary of Daddy’s death. I’m in a very surprising place – I’m actually overwhelmingly sad. Almost the saddest I’ve been since he took his last breath, and I’m not really sure why. Which is why I’m here, sorting through the waves, finding the core of this, so I might honor and release the emotions.
I can’t recall if I spelled out the full magical tale of Dad’s death when it all went down, so I’m going to summarize the events once more. It reads like a mythical tale, but I promise every word is true. If Z hadn’t been there to witness it all with me, I might not believe it myself.
The biggest bond I shared with my father invovled our Sunday morning church excursions. When I was tiny, Daddy always went to the big grand Helena Cathedral by himself, as Mom wasn’t into the religion thing back then. Since I owned the “Daddy’s Little Girl” title with a ferocious tenacity, I decided when I was four that it was my job to be his companion. Looking back now, I know that was the greatest gift I could have ever offered him. As the years went on, sometimes those rides to / from church (it took about 40 minutes to get there from our remote mountain home) were full of fights and angry words. Sometimes we fairly much ignored each other. And sometimes we told jokes, stopped for donuts on the way home, and found the most sacred moments of our shared lives. They’re all sacred now to me. Every last memory. Daddy gave me God and Jesus, however distorted the imageries were. He still brought me to this path I’m on now, even if he didn’t really understand my methods.
We went through devastatingly dark times. Months of silence, crazy screaming matches, and horrible, horrible words. We knew how to button push, and we did it frequently. As I got older, this of course subsided, and we fell into a pretty peaceful groove. Daddy became a sweet soul in his older years – such a contrast from the drunken, rageful man he used to be. Thank goodness he lived long enough to find himself. At least we got to end on a good note.
When I discovered my shamanism path, Dad did a remarkable job of trying to understand it – something I didn’t expect. He took to calling the ceremonial state “The Trance”, and supported me in the joy it brought me. But just one week after my return from Peru Trip Two, I got the call we all dread. And I knew it was coming.
The recent trip had had a very profound effect on me. I went very deep into the medicine and her many lessons, and had some intense ceremonies. During my sixth dance with Ayahuasca, the oddest thing occurred – just as the force of her made me question whether or not I was strong enough to shoulder the experience, to actually live to tell the tale, I felt an energetic burst into a light-filled world, and who should be standing there with open arms – but Jesus. Jesus? Yeah, Jesus. This wasn’t a hallucination – he was actually standing there. A half smile playing at his lips. I said to him – “Holy shit, it’s Jesus!” Then I covered my mouth and apologized, saying – “Oh my God, I’m so sorry. I totally just swore at you” To which he laughed, which made me laugh, and I stood there in my vision with an incredulous look.
“Why me? Why are you here?”
He didn’t answer, but grabbed my hand and let me feel the crucifixion scar on one of his wrists. Over and over, he rubbed his fingers across the wound, smiling at me with his eyes. Then I asked if I could have a hug, of which he obliged, wrapping around me tightly in the most incredible embrace. I clung to him joyfully, tearfully, and then just as suddenly, he was gone.
The ceremony went on to be my most uplifting, powerful experience to date. And I remember thinking so much of the time – I can’t wait to tell Daddy.
A week later, after the homecoming, Z and I went dancing – out with the usual beloved crew. The music was awesome, inside my favorite venue, and all the Favorite Friends were out in full force. I chose not to alter my consciousness, as I was still integrating Ayahuasca’s lessons, but all the other elements of an incredible evening were there for me to enjoy. Only I didn’t enjoy them. I felt edgy and nervous, panicky and sad. We only lasted a couple of hours before I finally told Z I had to go home. Had to. Something was going down.
I don’t remember what we talked about all night, but it was an ugly emotional throwdown. I was absofuckinglutely miserable, and I couldn’t put my finger on why. Around 7 AM, I just started sobbing. An overwhelming outpour. And Z, out of nowhere, says to me the strangest of words -
“You walked with Jesus. You walked with Jesus.”
I stopped crying for a second and whipped around to face him.
“What? WHY WOULD YOU SAY THAT?”
I felt angry and so fucking raw. Something huge was happening. Something really huge.
“I don’t know! It’s been going over in my head a million times and I knew I just had to say it.”
This sent me overboard. I felt the agonizing sob rise up in me like a volcanic eruption. And just as I felt her surface, the phone rang. I saw Mom’s name on the caller ID and my heart stopped. Here was my answer.
She, of course, called to tell me Daddy was sick. He had had minor surgery a few days prior, which we all thought had gone very well, but had taken a horrible turn during the night. They didn’t think he would make it, since at one point he did truly die, but he had come back, barely, and I needed to get there immediately. Z and I booked a flight in two hours and the rest of the day became a blur.
When at last we hit the hospital, I raced to Daddy’s side. He held on to just a thread of consciousness, but recognized that I was in the room. That night it was all touch and go again – but he held on tight as he knew the other 4 kids were racing to get there too.
The next morning, in the ICU, we got the good news that he had pulled through and was pretty coherent. I went in to take my turn with him. The nurse we encountered cornered me before we entered, and asked if I was his daughter Tina. I confirmed this, and she told me the most incredible thing – Daddy had been in a trance all morning, for hours on end, saying simply:
Tina knows Jesus. My daughter knows Jesus. How does Tina know Jesus?
I will never forget how I felt when I heard those words. It was as if everything mystical, everything unexplainable that had ever, ever happened to me, that I had maybe only half believed but wanted to trust completely, suddenly became factual. Everything was true. I had never gotten the chance to tell my parents about the vision / experience in Peru concerning Jesus. Not a word. Daddy couldn’t have known, and yet – he did. He knew.
I went into his room quietly, feeling as if I had walked into a vortex. He saw me right away and reached out a swollen, purple hand.
“Hi Daddy,” I squeezed him and dribbled tears on his arm.
“Hi Teen. Did you meet Jesus in The Trance?”
I laughed out loud and cried a little more, nodding and grinning.
“I did Daddy. I totally did.”
It made perfect sense to him. Perfect sense. He was only half in the default world, half in the next world. I knew then he would be leaving for good very soon.
He then told me how he had met Jesus the night before, and how He had sent him back down to finish one last mission. One last repenting gesture. To apologize to my brother for all the abuse.
I raced out to fetch the brother involved, knowing this was about to be the most treasured moment of his life so far. What my father gifted us during those days will never be duplicated. He held on for 7 of them, and we got to bond and tell stories and be real. Heal the hurts from the past, and show our souls, all perfect and luminous. All the many stories we held about why we don’t get along disappeared into the ethers for the duration of that week, and though it ended with my father’s death, it still stands as one of the best weeks of my life.
Daddy asked me, three days before he left us, if it was ok to die. If I thought that would be ok. And when he did, another convergence rose up in me – I suddenly remembered my second Ayahuasca ceremony, a scene in which my father’s spirit came to me, filled with sadness, resistance and pain.
“Daddy,” I said to him, “what on earth is wrong?”
“I’m afraid to die, Teen. I’m so afraid to die. Can you help me?”
I remember the monstrous ache this caused in me, this hopeless rush of sadness, as I had no clue how to help him. No clue at all. But I held him in my vision and promised I would do all I could.
Now here he was, just seven months later, on the verge of letting go, asking me for help.
“Daddy, of course you can go. Of course you can. I’ll take care of Mom, don’t you worry.”
“Your mother doesn’t want me to go. Your brothers don’t want me to go. Your sister doesn’t want me to go.”
“I know Daddy. None of us want to lose you. But this is your life, your calling. You follow your heart.”
He repeated my words back to me.
“Follow my heart. I have to follow my heart.”
Daddy would slip in and out of his own trance for the next three days, repeating those words, from what I’m told, thousands of times. He felt the pull of the family begging him to stay, but I had also given him a life raft in that moment – the permission to do whatever he had to. My gift to him. He gave me life, and in turn, I got to help give him back to God.
And now I sit here, sobbing my eyes out once again. Yes, it’s partly because I miss him. But mostly, it’s because my mind doesn’t know what to do with such beauty. Such perfection. Such magic. My heart feels strong and grateful and connected. I believe my father is right here with me, as much as I believe there are words on this screen. I guess I’m crying for the beauty of it all. For the incredible gift of these moments, these memories – and the ease of which they slip beneath the illusion of the outside world.
Today, I am remembering. I am swimming in my faith that anything is possible. And I am spending the day with my Daddy.
this is a very touching story
chills from head to toe when reading this… (in a good way)
the powers that be work in such beautiful(sometimes bittersweet )ways.