Dia De Los Muertos was a beautiful celebration for me this year. I felt an enormous sense of pride to put the ofrenda together in our new house, bigger, with more “detallitos” than before. I watched with the admiration of a small child as I went through the transformation from a woman who felt tired from running errands all day into a grand Catrina, strong in her power, secure in herself. To see myself, realizing that it wasn’t that I had changed into someone different but that I was the energy within both. Noticing the symbolism of the butterfly within my own life and evolution, alongside the incredible journey the butterfly makes from Mexico to Kentucky not too far from where I live now. I felt myself flood with tears and appreciation for my ancestors in ways I had never felt before.
Dia De Los Muertos is a celebration, an understanding that death is not to be feared, it also brings a greater respect for life while we have the breath to be here to witness it.
I understand it, I do, but I also found myself to feel so sad and I got to process another layer of grief through this special night. Plain and simple, I miss them. I miss them in all the ways a human being can miss someone. It’s in the little details that are so easy for us to overlook or claim to be too busy for and yet through a whole relationship with someone are what you end up missing the most.
My grandparents were a significant part of my childhood, they represented to me unconditional love. They were a mirror of my cultural background that I didn’t have to hide from because I loved them and when I was with them it didn’t bother me that I was different. I didn’t have to hide that I could speak Spanish, in fact my ability to do so strengthened our connection. They lived in government housing and when I stayed there I never felt like I was lacking, there was always a delicious meal to be had, merlot lipstick on my cheek from the kisses that were abundant and smell that when I pick it up now instantly wraps me up in love.
If Dia De Los Muertos is a way for us to not see death as an ending and we know that our ancestors are within us and always with us then why does their crossing over feel so empty and permanent?
First we have to honor what we feel as human beings, death feels like she has taken something away from us. It turns all of our memories into only something that exists within us and never to be seen or experienced in the outside world again. Maybe what feels worse is that we won’t be making any more memories together. There are no more phone calls, we cannot hear their voice or feel their touch, I’ll never be able to visit that two bedroom apartment again or be that child who felt their physical protection. Thats it, the humanity of the connection is gone. That connection transforms into one that can only be felt through spirit and while that connection in itself has held its own gifts, does death not show us how truly priceless a human connection can be?
If that is the lesson death has to teach us and what is to be realized here, then how can we transform all of those big emotions into a life full of memories worth leaving behind when we too become ancestors?
We have a habit of bottling up emotions across the board but when it comes to death we feel like we cannot fully express the amount of sorrow, loss and pain we feel when someone we have loved so much is no longer in this world alongside us. We numb and distract ourselves from not only feeling but letting anyone see just how much we have loved like it’s a negative thing that we are capable of holding and experiencing that magnitude of energy.
I’ve heard people say that time heals all wounds and I’ve also heard the saying “it doesn’t get easier, we get stronger.” Maybe it’s not about either, maybe it’s about allowing ourselves to let that wound pour out all of that love we once held out into the world without trying to bypass the fact that in doing so we will feel every bit of that absence. We become proud ancestors by living in the world in which we have experienced such wonderful human connections and we remember that feeling grief and loss doesn’t make us weak. In fact, we feel those feelings because we have felt so much unconditional love, intention and appreciation, we are alive, we can FEEL and these lives that we have loved were mirrors that have shown us what we are made and capable of.
How can we bring some of that love into the world by honoring our grief?
