The (Late) Morning of July Fourteenth

I have been thinking of death and passing and what remains following. Just this morning, I finished reading Daniel Pinchbeck's Breaking Open the Head, and I left thinking about the Dead. When thinking about death, I inevitably, and usually quite swiftly, come to think of Gretchen and her father. I met Gretchen's father only once, which came between conversations that Gretchen and I had been having concerning him. He performed music, amongst other skills, and had taught Gretchen much about music and had led her, a good deal, down her spiritual route. Such leading was not always intentional nor always obvious, but it was the reality of his coming death that brought to bear issues of note, particularly about the meaning and the result of death.

Gretchen is a Christian. I know that she experiences divinity frequently, not just in prayer or meditation, but in her life. For many people, for many friends, this is true; but I have never met someone for whom it is more outstanding than for Gretchen. I do not subscribe to similar beliefs, but neither are our beliefs inconsistent, at least in the moral or dogmatic ways; that is, we get along very well and can easily agree about the sort of course of action to take, as well as benefit on discovering that course of action together. These conversations on death generally and her father's passing more specifically, especially when handling the reality of my grandmother's death, was enlightening.

Gretchen then shared with me that she felt that her father's most outstanding quality, the spiritual reality of his core, was his music-making. This, we supposed, would be the attribute most likely to be carried with him into whatever was ahead of him. For Gretchen, death and the heavenly afterlife involves unification with God, God as active savior and creator; therefore, her father would then be part of this salvation and creation that is essentially divine. The most primary attribute, the music-making, of her father would persevere into the ecstatic music of the universe and in fact be part of the creation and re-creation of the universe's layers of rich harmonies. His passing, then, would not result in the conclusion of her interaction with her father, but be suffused with the joy of musical accompaniment, of the sounds of wind in leaves, or grass rustling together; the crash of thunder and the tapping of rain; the intonations of a choir, the echoes of voices in a chapel, or the rhythmic chatter of happy attendees. Music already suffuses the world, but now it is enriched by the spiritual reality of another participant.

Now, I have finished reading Breaking Open the Head and I return to the reality of death. I wonder about the occurrence of the Dead in dreams, the impressions of someone in a crowd, the whispers of a familiar but absent voice. I wonder about the presence of the Dead here, not in a spooky old house or in a séance, but the way those who have passed guide, mislead, accompany, and haunt us. I am less certain of an afterlife “out there,” but Gretchen's notion of the universe and the afterlife is not “out there,” it is dramatically present. Frequently, deaths do not come happily packed up with conclusions and, as a result, we encounter the attempts of ourselves and our intimates in reaching or synthesizing closure. A psychiatrist or even a priest, as well as the usual layman, likely would posit that our psyches are attempting to consolidate the character who was, with the present realities of that person's death and our own lives. This is inadequate, though I am unsure if I can say exactly why.

I lie to myself and, less often, I lie to those around me. Such transgressions or innocent omissions usually initiate feelings of uncertainty and perhaps even distrust. I have come to appreciate and discern honesty or self-honesty with trust or self-trust. Dishonesty in one form or another, results in tension that I want to resolve; whereas trust underlies and founds the realities of honest and dishonesty, without it, honesty does even come into the equation. I am trying to trust myself more, trust my thoughts and my behaviors and my intentions; but the reality of trust, or the potential to trust myself has allowed me to be harshly honest with myself for some time now.

When it comes to the stories of the Dead—dreams, sounds, “haunts,” et cetera—they are more often about establishing balance and resolving tension than they are about creating and breeding problems. The scenes of the King's Ghost visiting Hamlet come to mind: What is at stake in the conclusion of the tension Hamlet, the Queen, and Hamlet's Uncle feel toward one another, as well as the confusion and social coherence of kingdom as a whole, which is marked by the emotional, psychic, and political uncertainties of the supporting characters. The conflict within Hamlet begins before the play starts and it is the motion of the tragedy to resolve that conflict, which is successful but in a markedly unfortunate manner. It is not in the wishes of the phantom of the King to have things fall out in such a way, but he even attempts to guide and limit Hamlet's actions to minimize the damage that has already been done. Here, we see that the Dead are involved in resolution, not in conflict.

If the Ghost of the King is only a delusion—which the attention of the guards suggests otherwise—then the confusion of the play, the personal dreaming and doubt of Hamlet would begin here rather than before. Instead, the presence of the Dead is functionally in support of harmony and resolution amongst the living. Hamlet is not dishonest with himself when he speaks with the Ghost, rather he is expressing his love to a manifested entity. This entity evades materialist thinking, it even avoids contact with contemporary incarnations of Abrahamic faith traditions, but we undergo conversation and even cohabitation with the Dead predominantly to resolve, even to re-establish self-trust and honesty with family and friends. It is through the conclusion of earthly and mortal troubles that the Dead may participate in unification rather than division.