Can Death Be Transcended?

This gift of a world of experience that God/Source gave me turned into a harsh, cruel world for me sometime in my early childhood. One of our dogs gave birth to a litter of puppies that was put in a gunnysack and drowned in the creek right after birth. It was done from an intention of doing the right and compassionate thing, because too many dogs in the context of that time and place equaled a pack that could wipe out a neighbor’s entire pasture of livestock.

But I didn’t understand that at the time—not that any rationalization mattered. All I knew were my own feelings of devastation, along with the mother’s, at the loss of all of that playful life. It’s the only time I recall of ever running away from home--which was to a place in the currant bushes a few trees into the shelter belt closest to the house--where I bawled out my distress and pain.

In looking back, it was one of those life-influencing moments where the door to the magic land closed. The new portal that was opened and that I’ve been exploring ever since is the one where the pre-dominant belief has been, “This is a cruel world and this is what you do to survive in it…and some of the things you have to do, you’re not going to like…but that’s life…that’s just the way it is…”

So, my question is, and has been all along: Can death be transcended? I really desire to know that it truly can. My own death doesn’t scare me, but losing my loved ones to death scares the hell out of me. I’m so tired of it. Eleven days ago I was done writing because death came calling at my doorstep once again and hit me where it could hurt the most. I literally lost it all for awhile. I couldn’t seem to get myself centered in the present moment and then I got a cold like I haven’t had in years and I just torpedoed into crazy land.

But, here I am, writing, getting centered, telling myself out loud over and over again, “I am that I am!!! I AM that I AM!!! Telling myself to trust that part of me that “knows” this experience is going somewhere that I truly don’t want to miss out on. So, at the risk of showing to the world how big a fool I can be, I’m writing everything down. I don’t know where this will lead. I only have the sense that it’s going to take a few postings and this first one will be a long one.

Part of this past week has been a process of becoming aware of all the voices that I’ve been listening to: mass consciousness, my own aspects, parents, teachers, preachers, any of the people around me at a given time, my “I am” voice, to name a few. This week one of those aspect voices came screaming to the forefront. She’s been pulling on my strings for a very long time, sometimes quietly, sometimes raging. And I’ve worked long and hard to try to quiet her, even avoid her, but she won’t shut up. I will call her Pure Desolation, a.k.a. All-Aloneness.

July 21, 1984: That’s the night Penny Lee Lewton died. Yes, my heart continued beating and my brain waves, waving—but while my biology kept on going, something intrinsically me died that night. I’m not sure what to call it even. I just lost HER.

That’s the night I returned home from a night out (the night from Hell) with my cousin and a friend of ours in Baker, MT. Pat had invited me to ride along with him—he was going over to have Brenda, our barber friend, cut his hair. Earlier, I had called Arlen to see if he’d go with me to the movie “Sixteen Candles” that was showing in town but he declined because he’d taken the weekend off from his job to help his family with harvest.

I felt a bit hurt and angry with him—this would later turn into the guilt trip (yes, from Hell) that lasted me decades—but decided I’d ride along with Pat for something to do. His staying home to help the family by working was a noble thing—I was being frivolous and irresponsible and demanding. It took me well over 25 years to realize that I’d actually offered Arlen a different path that night—but no, I had to view myself as a selfish little bastard instead, and punish myself accordingly.

We got to Baker, and Brenda cut Pat’s hair, after which we went to one of the bars for a drink. It seemed we just set foot in the bar when some inebriated guy took a shine to me. I tried convincing him that I was unavailable—even tried passing Pat off as my boyfriend—but the guy didn’t buy it and continued making advances.

We finally left Baker and on the drive home all I remember is thinking over and over to myself--I can’t wait to get home to Arlen. I can’t wait to get home to Arlen…
But when Pat pulled the car up in our driveway, Dad, Mom, Laurie and Dave stood outside the back door on the steps waiting for me.

I don’t remember the exact words, only that Dad told me Arlen had been hit by a car and killed while crossing the highway on his motorcycle on his way home from the field.

All I remember is screaming over and over into the night, “No-oooo! No-ooo…” For once, I didn’t give a shit what the neighbors or anyone thought.

And it’s the one night I experienced my solid, strong but gentle mom completely left hanging out there, not knowing how she was going to console or pick up the broken being that was her daughter.

Mom knew all too well the pain of losing loved ones to death. Her own rock-of-the-family mother had died when Mom was 19—only six weeks after she and Dad got married. Her youngest brother shot himself after being left paralyzed from an auto accident—he’d also been in his twenties. She’d also lost her only sister to cancer in the early 1970s.

After this night we had in common an experience neither of us ever wished on anyone—ever. But the damn thing called Death keeps happening.

Laurie slept in my bed alongside me those first few nights. I felt SO ALONE in my loss of Arlen. And when I think of it, we all uniquely experience the loss just as we do the life—no one’s is greater, just different and the only of its kind.

Mornings were Hell—one more day to get through, one day further away from touching Arlen. I just wanted to be held by him, but it wasn’t happening. I just wanted to be held, but I didn’t know how to ask for it. I was terrified of forgetting with the passage of time, the smallest detail of the moments we had shared.

I was aware that I was an aching reminder to Arlen’s family of the void left by Arlen’s death, though they were so good to me. I was painfully aware that I was a reminder to my own brother of the best friend he’d lost. Tim and Cheri and Arlen and I had done everything together. They had set us up and were with us on our first date. I couldn’t give Tim his best friend back. It almost felt as though he’d entrusted me with something priceless and I’d screwed up and lost it all, for all of us.

I felt like a walking bomb of pain that people tolerated—that I no longer really fit in anywhere. At least, not in the places I had when I was a part of the twosome called Arlen and Penny.

Christmas was Hell. Everyone around me kept on with their traditions, lives, families—but my celebrating had stopped. And I couldn’t find the words to express it—it just moldered away inside of me. I had no future, no partner, no children—I was in the world, but for all intents and purposes, I was dead at twenty.

I know I walked around with a scowl etched on my face. I was angry as hell with God, believing He was punishing me for not loving Arlen enough by taking him away from me. You know, “Nip that emerging tyrant in the bud.”

I remember likening the whole experience to feeling as though I’d been thrown face-down into a pile of gravel with a hand at the back of my head pressing and grinding my face in deeper.

I don’t remember confiding many of these things to the people around me—maybe some I did—but much of it I kept to myself, mainly because I had no words.

I SO DID NOT take Arlen’s death gracefully, in any way, shape or form. But I kept my most tortured parts of myself to myself.

After all, according to the belief of the time, sacrificing one’s own happiness for that of another was what it was all about. So I moved forward choosing to enslave myself in what was a distorted form of service to the never-ending supply of wounded ones outside of me, all in an attempt to keep Pure Desolation, who resided inside me, from feeling All-Alone. She just wanted to be held…

Maybe, just maybe, everything will be alright…I’m hoping that’s where I’m headed with all this…

For more about Arlen click to access the following post: In Loving Memory and Honor...Arlen