It’s not that I took a break from blogging, but the Medium website, where I’ve written a thing or two, has a writing contest going and two of the fields in which one could enter were “death” and “re-entry.” So, of course, I just cracked my knuckles and dove in, because that’s the subject matter I live in these days. If you’re interested, they’re here. We’ll know in a month or so how that worked.
Of course, even if all I get is a nice “thanks for trying” note, it’s worth it. Writing about my life post-Colin is simultaneously exhausting and rewarding. After banging out the two essays for Medium, I didn’t have it in me to crunch out something new for this blog. But it remains so important to me to get his name out there. To keep his memory alive in this little way. I don’t rely on the show “The Boys” a whole lot for inspiration. Truth be told, it’s pretty damned dark, so it’s not the kind of place I would normally think about heading for inspiration. But one character had a wonderful line in a recent episode I watched. It’s to the effect of:
You die twice, once when you stop breathing and the other when someone says your name for the last time.
That’s Frenchie in “The Boys.” I can’t remember to whom he attributes the quote. Running a Google search, I’ve found it attributed to Banksy, Mackelmore and Irvin Yalom, and that’s all the work I’m going to do for a quote that I’m only using to illustrate a point. The point is, it does feel like I keep him alive in some small way doing this.
At the same time, I question the other ways I keep his legacy going. Like, right now in Germany – as just about everywhere else – you can only get a vaccine if you’re 12 and up. So, Emma got her second shot yesterday, but that leaves Noah dangling for now. I have to admit, I’m inches away from contacting pediatricians, telling them my whole story and ending with a hearty “I don’t want to go through this again. Please vaccinate my 11-year-old.” I mean, good God, he’s taller than most 14-year-olds (and yes, I know that’s not the way vaccinations work). It feels odd, even thinking about using my tragedy to get a leg up on this pandemic. On the flip side, why even risk going through another child’s death?
But it doesn’t stop there. I think about switching jobs all the time. I think about trying to get some of my fiction published. And, in the back of my head, there’s this urge to add a PS along the lines of “I’ve been through hell watching my kid die. Could you just help me out and give me this?” I don’t do it, because it’s hard to see that actually helping me. But the temptation is there. It’s really there at every point in my life. The people in front of me in line, the people dickering with me about doctor’s appointments, the people who catch mistakes in my work. “Can’t you see what I’m going through here? Can’t you just let this slide?”
Except I know that’s not genuine. That would easily slip into me abusing Colin’s memory, turning my sadness into an ice breaker to get me through any kind of problem in the world. But I can’t do that. There’s a pretty big line between remembering Colin and spending the rest of my life being the guy whose son died. So I have to find a balance.
I am going to keep an eye out though, should we get a chance to get an 11-year-old vaccinated. I think Colin could get behind that.