It’s been 8 years since Noah left us and still
sometimes I can’t believe or accept it. The other day I stumbled into a grief surge
while singing the old John Prine song “Angels from Montgomery.” Lines from the
chorus seized in my throat and I could only croak: Just give me one thing
that I can hold on to/To believe in this living is just a hard way to go.
Was that how Noah felt in the last weeks or months of his life? How could this precious
child have slipped through our grasp?
June 28 will be his should-have-been 30th
birthday. I can’t help dwelling in the fantasy of it: Noah appearing at our
door, radiant and healthy in the prime of life. The dogs berserk at his
arrival, him leaning down to rough them up. The family party we would have had in
the backyard with his trademark birthday apple pie à la mode. The late-night after
party he would have had with old friends from the old neighborhood, new friends
we’d never met, crowded into the den to binge on wine and movies. His arm
around a lover he could be himself with, no airs.
In my daydream, what happened on March 19, 2013, when
he was 21 was an attempt, not a suicide. I like to think that after
a scary time and setbacks in his early twenties, he would have come back to
himself. I visualize him taking charge of his mental health without shame and
continuing to reach out to others who were struggling. I like to think he would
have quit smoking, started meditating, gone back to surfing and to backpacking
with his dad.
I’m not sure he would have managed to graduate from
his beloved Wesleyan. But he would have stayed in touch with far-flung college
friends and visited his European friends and French host family. I imagine that
after stints working on sailboats and teaching English and interning with a photographer
he admired, he might have come home to Los Angeles to work in the movie
industry. He would have been a quick learner, as always. By 30, maybe he would have
landed a photography job with a production company and been helping friends on
their independent film projects, still aspiring to be a filmmaker himself. Might
he have been relieved to step into a new decade and leave behind the troubles
of his twenties?
I have to believe that Noah and I would have
reconciled. He would have hugged and teased me again and sat down for the occasional
heart-to-heart. And he would have drawn ever closer to his older brother Ben, joining
him on Himalayan treks and Burning Man installations (though Ben may not have
been living overseas or making art the way he has without having lost his
brother the way he did). As they moved further into adulthood, I would have so treasured times when I could cook and hike
and watch films with both my beautiful boys.
It’s hard enough for parents to get used to the idea of a living child reaching the milestone of 30. When a child dies at 21, their should-have-been 30th is all the more unsettling; we have no map for the intervening years. "He was still so young," says my husband, "he could have gone in so many different directions." All I can do is let the fantasy roll with wishes for Noah’s health and happiness--and with sorrow that I’ll never get to know and love his future self.
*
To my fellow survivors:
What fantasies of your loved one come to mind as time passes since your loss? What
future self do you imagine for them? I hope these thoughts of what might have been are comforting ways
to stay connected.
