Good grief
January 21, 2007 | 12:00am
Last week, my best friend was laid to rest. It literally took crossing the ocean for me to get to him. I caught the red-eye flight going back to Manila from the US. I caught the funeral. After preparing my eulogy, which sounded kinda insane, the next order of business was the pith of the shallow fruit. In and out, I felt like the perfect ghoul.
I decided that I would deal with his funeral, not with blind devastated grief (which is exactly what I felt), and try to do everything till the last day perfectly, like Bree Van De Kamp.
You see, our bond was cemented in fashion. He would nix or approve my clothes for ridiculous blind dates, patalbugan galas and even just quiet movie nights. So it was kinda hard dressing up for him, without having him around. I threw on maybe six dresses before settling on a Chloe dress that he would perhaps at best describe as "fairy-ish with zero sex appeal." I made an effort not to look like a grieving Italian widow clad in her black curtain and tablecloth or a Texan gold digger complete with flashy rings and low riders for his funeral. There is something about funeral clothes that is depressing. His family made sure to dress up in happy clothes, lots of blues and whites. That’s the way it should be done. It confuses me how people gravitate toward the most boring and hideous things in their closets when attending a funeral. The word is dignified, and there is no dignity in school-marm cardigans or polyester pants. He would have cringed from the clouds if he saw any of his friends in anything polyester even. After attempting to look human while doing a mille-feuille of shimmer creams and radiance boosters on my Skeletor face, I still looked like a bloodshot rat, like Steve Buscemi. So Steve Buscemi in a eunuch fairy dress had to do for my final goodbye outfit. Not quite perfect.
This unfounded obsession with finding the right outfit to wear to his funeral was, of course, just a ridiculous ploy for me to delay the inevitable: the gutting of every emotion I have left in me with his departure.
Today, dealing with grief is kind of tricky at a time when antidepressants or anti-anxiety pills save or rather rob you from experiencing the hysteria of the cards life has dealt you. You feel like a hull, an empty shell with baggage that seems to attach itself to the nape of your neck and the tips of your shoulders. Inside the ache is an emptiness.
People grieve in different ways: some drink till they’re cross-eyed; some simply pretend it didn’t happen; and some just find someone to hook up with to distract themselves from such a loss. As silly as the last one may seem, I have seen it happen. We all need our crutches. Because we may be well-equipped for many disappointments like losing our jobs or leaving a once-sizzling romance. However, the permanence of losing someone is something no one is ever ready for. It changes you forever.
The following days are like riding waves with devastation and depression cresting them. Every pretty girl reminds me of him, every stupid song (like Bette Midler’s Wind Beneath My Wings and even Kylie’s Can’t Get You Out of My Head) somehow becomes about him, every street in Makati, every Starbucks, even seeing sneakers remind me of him. I keep sending messages to his number even if I meant to send it to other people, I keep calling everyone Joel and when I see something cool I immediately think about telling him about it and quickly realize that I can’t. I live and bathe in his memory. One morning, I woke up at 6 a.m. and searched for photos with him on it. I put a picture of him on my TV, Mac, cellular phone, my desk, my dining table, every corner I could find. I Googled him every 30 minutes and checked his Friendster account (I’m glad he kept it despite me always ribbing him about it) hoping to find him in the Internet somehow. I was going insane. I realized I was going extremely nuts when I found myself sobbing in the inspirational aisle of National Bookstore, blubbering to Mitch Albom. JT loved shit like this and I couldn’t be bothered. I read self-centered person books like Freakonomics or anything by Augusten Burroughs. He called my selection "cheap reading." I would rather wear polyester than be caught in the inspirational aisle. He probably tried to give my cheap reading a try because his last book was We Want You to be Rich by Donald Trump and something about a Japanese tycoon that he borrowed from my brother’s bookshelf. He never finished it. I always made fun of him when he read poems, but I secretly loved it about him. He loved his little poems.
The following week, life actually had to begin again. I was back to booking shoots, writing beauty articles and critiquing Golden Globes red carpet fashion. I scheduled my Pilates classes and tried to do cardio and stop eating all the comfort food that I had indulged in the week before. I was eating four double cheeseburgers a day before then. These were all supposed to be good for me. But how can one resume and go back to the fray after such a loss? How can things ever be the same? Somehow, in time, I have to stop grieving and stop looking for him on the Internet. For now, I just want to nail myself to the bed and watch bad TV forever.
Grieving is a weird emotion. It’s not all about sadness. There’s a bit of happiness because every inane memory means so much more now. It makes you see things differently. It puts a limit on everything. You feel your mortality, and all of a sudden everything is illuminated, as the title of Jonathan Safran Foer’s book says. Everything that was once important becomes negligible. Trivial spats are closed with heartfelt apologies. And things you once took for granted are now gilded with value. You suddenly feel alienated from everyone who didn’t know him so well. Marcel was not that close to him, and I find it hard to connect with him these days. Although he’s the perfect boyfriend being there for me, I just find it hard being around people who didn’t see or love JT the way I do. I saw a video with him dancing and swimming, and he looked so alive. So alive and yet so untouchable. It was like having a dream while I was wide awake.
I lost my grandfather a few years ago, and though his loss still brings tears to my eyes up to this day, I expected it and was given a year and a half to prepare for it. Losing my friend was unexpected. I wasn’t supposed to bury him, ever. It never even crossed my mind.
We were supposed to see each other get married to our great loves and gossip about our bratty children. I wanted to do that with him. The first few days we were allowed to act insane and cry, but now that time has passed, it gets harder to show grief. Again I have to put on that brave face. I stopped crying. I’m emotionally drained, cleansed and sanitized by the antiseptic of loss. Behind closed doors, I indulge and watch movies about death (Garden State, Defending Your Life and What Dreams May Come), read Mitch Albom and stare at pictures, hoping that somehow it will bring something back to life. It’s like life is now divided in two: life with JT and life without JT.
Many people I have met, especially those who have lost a child, are never the same. They change jobs or quit altogether. It renews lost bonds or separates existing ones forever. Again, death changes people. It should.
Who wants to live life looking the other way, anyway? I know that with JT gone, nothing will be the same, ever. However, I also know that it also won’t be for the worst even if he will be sorely missed.
I tell my friends if you want to watch an instructional video on how not to grieve, then see Iñarritu’s 21 Grams. Where I am right now is probably what most shrinks in soap operas would call rock bottom. I’m at work burning under the fluorescent light, around people who didn’t know him. I can’t talk about him because it’s just not professional, I guess. I silently go through pages for this week’s YStyle not really seeing anything. Then I remember something he told me the last time I was with him. He was talking about his breakup with his sweet girlfriend Lisa, and told me, "You know what? I’m just gonna ride this one. No more delaying the inevitable. No rebound chicks or even clubbing. I’ll just feel it and know that this will pass and I’ll be ready for bigger things."
Looking back, he was giving me something to remember.
They say when you die you lose the total weight of 21 grams. His spirit may weigh 21 grams, but the weight of his memory defies the laws of physics.
I decided that I would deal with his funeral, not with blind devastated grief (which is exactly what I felt), and try to do everything till the last day perfectly, like Bree Van De Kamp.
You see, our bond was cemented in fashion. He would nix or approve my clothes for ridiculous blind dates, patalbugan galas and even just quiet movie nights. So it was kinda hard dressing up for him, without having him around. I threw on maybe six dresses before settling on a Chloe dress that he would perhaps at best describe as "fairy-ish with zero sex appeal." I made an effort not to look like a grieving Italian widow clad in her black curtain and tablecloth or a Texan gold digger complete with flashy rings and low riders for his funeral. There is something about funeral clothes that is depressing. His family made sure to dress up in happy clothes, lots of blues and whites. That’s the way it should be done. It confuses me how people gravitate toward the most boring and hideous things in their closets when attending a funeral. The word is dignified, and there is no dignity in school-marm cardigans or polyester pants. He would have cringed from the clouds if he saw any of his friends in anything polyester even. After attempting to look human while doing a mille-feuille of shimmer creams and radiance boosters on my Skeletor face, I still looked like a bloodshot rat, like Steve Buscemi. So Steve Buscemi in a eunuch fairy dress had to do for my final goodbye outfit. Not quite perfect.
This unfounded obsession with finding the right outfit to wear to his funeral was, of course, just a ridiculous ploy for me to delay the inevitable: the gutting of every emotion I have left in me with his departure.
Today, dealing with grief is kind of tricky at a time when antidepressants or anti-anxiety pills save or rather rob you from experiencing the hysteria of the cards life has dealt you. You feel like a hull, an empty shell with baggage that seems to attach itself to the nape of your neck and the tips of your shoulders. Inside the ache is an emptiness.
People grieve in different ways: some drink till they’re cross-eyed; some simply pretend it didn’t happen; and some just find someone to hook up with to distract themselves from such a loss. As silly as the last one may seem, I have seen it happen. We all need our crutches. Because we may be well-equipped for many disappointments like losing our jobs or leaving a once-sizzling romance. However, the permanence of losing someone is something no one is ever ready for. It changes you forever.
The following days are like riding waves with devastation and depression cresting them. Every pretty girl reminds me of him, every stupid song (like Bette Midler’s Wind Beneath My Wings and even Kylie’s Can’t Get You Out of My Head) somehow becomes about him, every street in Makati, every Starbucks, even seeing sneakers remind me of him. I keep sending messages to his number even if I meant to send it to other people, I keep calling everyone Joel and when I see something cool I immediately think about telling him about it and quickly realize that I can’t. I live and bathe in his memory. One morning, I woke up at 6 a.m. and searched for photos with him on it. I put a picture of him on my TV, Mac, cellular phone, my desk, my dining table, every corner I could find. I Googled him every 30 minutes and checked his Friendster account (I’m glad he kept it despite me always ribbing him about it) hoping to find him in the Internet somehow. I was going insane. I realized I was going extremely nuts when I found myself sobbing in the inspirational aisle of National Bookstore, blubbering to Mitch Albom. JT loved shit like this and I couldn’t be bothered. I read self-centered person books like Freakonomics or anything by Augusten Burroughs. He called my selection "cheap reading." I would rather wear polyester than be caught in the inspirational aisle. He probably tried to give my cheap reading a try because his last book was We Want You to be Rich by Donald Trump and something about a Japanese tycoon that he borrowed from my brother’s bookshelf. He never finished it. I always made fun of him when he read poems, but I secretly loved it about him. He loved his little poems.
The following week, life actually had to begin again. I was back to booking shoots, writing beauty articles and critiquing Golden Globes red carpet fashion. I scheduled my Pilates classes and tried to do cardio and stop eating all the comfort food that I had indulged in the week before. I was eating four double cheeseburgers a day before then. These were all supposed to be good for me. But how can one resume and go back to the fray after such a loss? How can things ever be the same? Somehow, in time, I have to stop grieving and stop looking for him on the Internet. For now, I just want to nail myself to the bed and watch bad TV forever.
Grieving is a weird emotion. It’s not all about sadness. There’s a bit of happiness because every inane memory means so much more now. It makes you see things differently. It puts a limit on everything. You feel your mortality, and all of a sudden everything is illuminated, as the title of Jonathan Safran Foer’s book says. Everything that was once important becomes negligible. Trivial spats are closed with heartfelt apologies. And things you once took for granted are now gilded with value. You suddenly feel alienated from everyone who didn’t know him so well. Marcel was not that close to him, and I find it hard to connect with him these days. Although he’s the perfect boyfriend being there for me, I just find it hard being around people who didn’t see or love JT the way I do. I saw a video with him dancing and swimming, and he looked so alive. So alive and yet so untouchable. It was like having a dream while I was wide awake.
I lost my grandfather a few years ago, and though his loss still brings tears to my eyes up to this day, I expected it and was given a year and a half to prepare for it. Losing my friend was unexpected. I wasn’t supposed to bury him, ever. It never even crossed my mind.
We were supposed to see each other get married to our great loves and gossip about our bratty children. I wanted to do that with him. The first few days we were allowed to act insane and cry, but now that time has passed, it gets harder to show grief. Again I have to put on that brave face. I stopped crying. I’m emotionally drained, cleansed and sanitized by the antiseptic of loss. Behind closed doors, I indulge and watch movies about death (Garden State, Defending Your Life and What Dreams May Come), read Mitch Albom and stare at pictures, hoping that somehow it will bring something back to life. It’s like life is now divided in two: life with JT and life without JT.
Many people I have met, especially those who have lost a child, are never the same. They change jobs or quit altogether. It renews lost bonds or separates existing ones forever. Again, death changes people. It should.
Who wants to live life looking the other way, anyway? I know that with JT gone, nothing will be the same, ever. However, I also know that it also won’t be for the worst even if he will be sorely missed.
I tell my friends if you want to watch an instructional video on how not to grieve, then see Iñarritu’s 21 Grams. Where I am right now is probably what most shrinks in soap operas would call rock bottom. I’m at work burning under the fluorescent light, around people who didn’t know him. I can’t talk about him because it’s just not professional, I guess. I silently go through pages for this week’s YStyle not really seeing anything. Then I remember something he told me the last time I was with him. He was talking about his breakup with his sweet girlfriend Lisa, and told me, "You know what? I’m just gonna ride this one. No more delaying the inevitable. No rebound chicks or even clubbing. I’ll just feel it and know that this will pass and I’ll be ready for bigger things."
Looking back, he was giving me something to remember.
They say when you die you lose the total weight of 21 grams. His spirit may weigh 21 grams, but the weight of his memory defies the laws of physics.
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