It was two trips in one. The Compassionate Friends national conference and a Cooper trip. Of course, without Cooper’s death, I wouldn’t even know about the conference and I certainly wouldn’t be driving through mountains with a jar of ashes. I’d choose Alive Cooper every time, but I didn’t get to choose. Instead, I’m living this unrequested life of mine, plugging along, surviving the impossible days and treasuring the good days. I’m not alone.
There were around 850 other attendees at the conference—an impressive, heartbreaking number when you think about the reason for the conference. Bereaved parents, grandparents, and siblings from across the country met in Denver to share and grow and just be. Not once over the course of the conference did anyone insinuate that we should be “over it” by now. For some attendees, the loss was a raw wound—under a year—and the shock was apparent on their faces, while others have been living with the scars of their loss for several decades. The loss is still there, written in their eyes, but life has smoothed the sharper edges over time. And I, at almost three years into this festival of hell, am still early in my grief. Not the early grief of those first days and weeks and months. Not so early that I can’t help others, but still early. Almost three years in, and it’s “early.”
There’s a degree of validation in hearing from experts, whether trained professionals or seasoned grievers, that what we feel is normal and legitimate. For a few days, I took a break from the perpetual pretending that makes life easier for everyone around me. For a few days, I could feel however I felt. Hugs were literally available on request. Some of the people running the conference had special ribbons attached to their lanyards; those kind souls were the comfort committee. Seriously.
I attended a variety of sessions, some general and others specific. It’s an interesting dynamic, sitting in a session focused on suicide grief. The people in the room are strangers bound together by tragedy. Strangers, but so much more. We don’t know each other at all, but we also know each other deeply. There’s no judgment, only understanding and support, reassurance and compassion. The guilt we feel and the unanswered questions we carry are a given—no need to explain or justify.
I won’t go into detail on the conference, other than to say it was a comforting breath of emotional fresh mountain air. I spent Thursday learning how to be a better group leader. Friday and Saturday were a mix of things for me and things for our local chapter. I presented Friday afternoon, didn’t throw up or wet myself, and ventured into the mountains as a reward for doing an okay job. Saturday night was a candle lighting ceremony (beautiful, moving, and exhausting); Sunday morning was a Walk to Remember. The conference wasn’t, nor was it intended to be, a magical cure. It was helpful and reassuring and validating. Next year, I’ll continue this journey in New Orleans. I look forward to not being a rookie.
And then there were the mountains and tunnels and creeks and ashes.
I hauled a portion of Cooper’s ashes to Colorado with the intention of releasing some ashes in the mountains, and that’s what I did. I left a bit of Cooper in three or four beautiful streams. He loved the mountains and I think he’d be okay with my decision. Too bad if he’s not, I guess. It was both difficult and soothing to watch the water first cloud with the ashes then carry him away. Each place I stopped offered a sense of peace, and he was a big fan of peace. So am I.
Nederland, where I stayed Sunday night, is a small mountain town. I have the strongest feeling that we stayed in the same hotel, shopped in the same grocery store, and visited the same shops. My favorite shop was called “Mountain Man Outdoor Store,” and that’s the only place I bought anything resembling a souvenir. We still refer to Coop as our mountain man, so shopping there seemed appropriate. I could so easily imagine Coop visiting with the shop owner—a hippy-dippy mountain man in his own right—that I couldn’t leave without a tangible reminder.
The rest of the time, though, I drove winding mountain roads with no destination in mind, and stopped to take pictures when I wanted. If a side road had an interesting name, I followed that road for a while. Coop and I are alike in many ways, including the tendency to drive around and see what we see. I understand why he loved the mountains and was drawn to that area.
What I saw and experienced defies description, but I’m no quitter. Here goes.
The mountains are life, full of Peaceful Valleys and Mayhem Gulches, of tiny mining towns converted to casino meccas. They are stretches of fallen or falling rocks (depending on the sign) and roaring mountain streams of clear icy water. They are trees and wildflowers, roots exposed, growing out of rock and somehow thriving. They are glorious meadows and improbable lakes hidden between peaks. They are palaces on mountaintops and shacks in valleys, scenic byways and dirt county roads. The mountains are a necessary connection to God, to Cooper, to myself. We could all learn from the mountains, peaceful valleys, mayhem gulches, and all.
Friends and family seemed to question the sanity of driving to and from Colorado by myself and I understand their concern, but I needed to do this. I know they worried, but I also know they had me covered in prayer and well wishes. There wasn’t a single moment of this trip that I didn’t feel I was doing the right thing. Okay, there were maybe three moments; one was the Kansas gas station with distinct Natural Born Killers vibes, one was the Taco Bell drive-thru worker with a big knife on his belt, and one was driving back into Denver in the dark Friday night. Other than that, it all felt right.
Going with what feels right is how I roll these days, and this time it was right.
Woods Writes 