Psychiatrist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross was born on July 8, 1926 in Zürich, Switzerland. She pioneered near-death studies and worked with the terminally ill. Kübler-Ross published the ground-breaking book On Death and Dying in 1969. The book describes grief as a process that may include five stages: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. Time magazine named Dr. Kübler-Ross ‘one of the “100 Most Important Thinkers” of the 20th century’. In her honor I am reprinting the post I wrote after the death of my mother-in-law. – Jadi
Her chair is in our living room. I curl up in it cross-legged; the air around it is empty.
I wash the leather cushion and back with a damp cloth. It swivels under my touch, then stills.
Her limbs did too, shortly before she died. I gave her the ritual of a final loving massage. It was gentle touch, my palm on her forehead, my hand over her heart.
Her ragged breathing calmed. I found myself matching her breaths. You can go, it’s okay. I thought those words, and said them aloud.
Her breaths slowed. In, out. In. Out. In….. out. In.
And just like that, she was gone.
Absence doesn’t make the heart grow fonder. A hole in the everyday has punched through the solar plexus of life’s waistcoat. I discover I can’t fill the resulting void.
My mother-in-law and I breathed together, the same air, for 24 years. I’m not able to breathe back out, because Mama’s no longer here to do it with me.
In memory of Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, July 8, 1926 – August 24, 2004
NOTES: © 2016 Jadi Campbell. Previously published as Breath.
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Anne Frank was born on June 12, 1929 in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. Her unexpectedly discovered journal The Diary of Anne Frank is a testament to the endurance of the human spirit. In honor of her life I am reprinting my first post about Stolpersteine, the Stumbling Stones laid throughout the world to remember the lives of those killed by repressive regimes. – Jadi
And I go for walks, and practice self-care. I love to cook, so that’s more than all right. I can take my time with elaborate recipes. Great way to channel my restlessness. Uwe and I live together in lockdown harmoniously most of the time.
Annie Edson Taylor was born on October 24, 1838 in Auburn, New York. On October 24, 1901, her 63rd birthday, she became the first person in history to go over Niagara Falls in a barrel and survive. Ms. Taylor hoped to secure her financial future with the stunt, but aside from some initial speaking engagements and a memoir she didn’t make much money. Her manager stole the barrel, and she had to use up her savings to hire private detectives to track him and the barrel down again. Annie died in Niagara County and her body is interred in the ‘Stunter’s Rest’ section of the Oakwood Cemetery in Niagara Falls on the New York side of the waters. In her honor I am reprinting a post I wrote after visiting the waterfalls of southern Laos. – Jadi
On our last trip to Laos we headed south to the quiet little city of Pakse in the Chapasak province. We wanted to see old ruins – and really spectacular waterfalls!
When the French colonized Laos they came up with a bold (and ultimately quixotic) plan to build a railway through the region. They wanted to go around the waterfalls and create a faster, easier way to travel and ship goods either to the north, or to the southern Vietnam port of Saigon. The result is what a CNN article wryly refered to as “Laos’ first railway: 14 km of rust” [2].
But oh, those waterfalls on the Bolaven Plateau: we hiked in to as many as our young guide was willing to take us to. And we didn’t even need a barrel.
