Authors: Day Rusk
I should note here that over the past two days before this late night incident, Dad, who could still speak then, but not as well as normal, probably due to the morphine drip, had been talking about his Father, my Grandfather, more than usual. Actually, I hadn’t heard him talk about Grandpa for quite some time, possibly years. This is important for what I believe, and I’ll get to it in a moment.
As I was stroking Dad’s cheek, holding his hand, and staring intently into his eyes, I could see and hear that his breathing was getting worst. I should add here, that his eyes were bright, not glossed over with morphine or disease, he seemed to be there, present in the moment; he was there with me. I knew he was struggling, though, and I don’t know why, but I felt I had to say something, I suspected the end was very near. I remember continuing to look deeply into his eyes and I said – I can’t remember it word for word right now, but it went something like this: “Dad, you know for weeks now your body has been slowly shutting itself down. You’ve been confined in this bed and this room for a long time, in pain. We love you deeply and don’t want you to go, but if there’s no chance you’re going to get better and out of this bed, we don’t want to see you suffer. We love you more than words can say, but if you’ve got a chance to let go and move on to a new world where you’re healthy and can be happy, you have to go for it. There’s more out there, a new adventure waiting and it’s time to go for it. Don’t hang on just for us; if you’ve got a chance to get out of this mess and move on, please take it.”
I’ve heard of the concept of giving someone permission to die in the past, but always thought it was just a Hollywood invention – a dramatic tool. I’ve heard of people supposedly holding on until they’ve seen a loved one for the last time, and when they finally saw that loved one, passing on. I thought it was all bullshit, but, after I said that to him, he took one breath, then another, and that was it, he was gone. Just like that. I remember my brother, sister and I timing his breaths, because those two last ones weren’t exactly right after one another, but after that last one, we kept watching him and the clock and when about two minutes had passed and we didn’t hear anything more, we figured it had happened; it’s funny because, you know, it’s just not that obvious to those of us who haven’t been around a lot of death in our lives.
I’d given him permission to go, to stop hanging on for us, but for some reason, as I thought about that
moment
over the next several days, and believe me, I thought about it often, I think what gave him extra permission to go was what he was trying to point at or indicate with his finger. I don’t know why I believe it, or why I’m so damned certain, but I know that Mom didn’t come to take Dad to the other side that night, but that over my shoulder, where he seemed to be pointing, his Father had come to get him – his Father had come to take his little boy to the other side at the end of his life. My sister said that morning Dad had been talking a lot about his Father to her. They’d always been close, and it had been a long time since they’d seen one another, my Dad having lost his Dad when he was in his forties – Dad passed at the age of sixty-four. I believe our permission and the fact his Father was there to take him to the afterlife, was what prompted him to finally stop fighting and just let go.
I believe that.
That’s why I believe there is something more or greater out there; just until that moment when I’m taking my last breath, I won’t know what it is.
Safia was probing; the topic was serious, so I figured, what the hell, why hold back? I might as well reveal to her what I believed; but at this early stage, I didn’t want to tell her about my Father and our experience together there at the end; I just wasn’t up for that.
“I believe there’s a greater power; a creator,” I finally said to her. “I believe he, she, or it watches over us, but truly doesn’t interfere, although in some cases, what some would call miracles, that God breaks that rule and gets involved. Maybe a subtle way of telling us there is something more out there. I don’t know. I just don’t believe that I’m going to die, arrive in Heaven, get in line and be told, ‘You know what, it was door number three. The Catholics were right. You spent your whole life being a good Christian; too bad, off to Hell with you. Bye-bye. Don’t let the Pearly Gates hit you on the ass on your way out.’ I think if anything is going to happen, I’m going to discover that God was simply amused by all these religions we’ve created to try and understand him...or her.”
“Or her?” she asked.
“Why not?” I said.
“Don’t get me wrong. While I don’t follow any specific religion, if it brings comfort to other people’s lives, then it’s doing more good than harm,” I continued. “I just believe that God is everywhere, and I don’t need a Church, Synagogue, Temple or Mosque to talk to him.”
“Or her,” she said.
I smiled, “Yes, or her.”
“My problem right now is, guys like Kareena’s boyfriend, he’s making religion an issue. He’s Muslim and he wants to let the world know that and he wants to judge others because of it.”
“He’s proud of his faith,” she said.
“Everyone is. Not just Muslims.”
Silence overtook us. I desperately wanted to know her thoughts, her true thoughts on all of this. I knew she wasn’t a practicing Muslim, but deep down what motivated her – what drove her? I was opening up, so I was hoping she’d do the same.
It goes without saying, our parents often shape who we are. Even if you’re the exact opposite of your parents, they’ve still shaped you. Because your mother or father was abusive or an alcoholic, you didn’t drink and did your best to raise your children in a loving and safe environment. You did the opposite of your parents, so in many ways that makes them responsible for shaping who you became. There’s no escaping their influence on us.
Safia’s parents had to have a huge influence on her. While she wasn’t sure about their religious beliefs and whether or not she was going to embrace them, deep down, how many of them had she embraced unconsciously? For all I know, our relationship had turned her into a deeply conflicted woman – even subconsciously. Deep down she might truly believe she was doing something wrong by being with me. Deep down, she might secretly believe, in some small part of her mind or soul that she was betraying everything she’d ever been taught and led to believe; she was sinning and turning her back on her faith and in turn her family.
I found in our conversations that she didn’t say as much as me; maybe because she wasn’t a writer – I mean, give us a forum or a keyboard and we can wax poetic forever, whether we’re making any sense or not. While she had revealed a great deal to me, she often played her cards close to the vest. Was this conflict in her beliefs; beliefs she thought she understood, but when confronted with them in a relationship such as ours, left her wondering? Or maybe it was more of a cultural thing? As a Muslim girl, I’d imagined she was raised to take a backseat to men in all things; since we’ve been seeing one another, I’ve been doing some reading and listening to Muslim issues on talk radio that seemed to rear their heads more often than expected. From what I gathered, women in these societies are second class citizens compared to the men; sure they loved their mothers and sisters and daughters, but they didn’t give them the same voice or standing as those born male. Maybe Safia wasn’t used to saying what she thought, because she’d been trained to believe it really didn’t matter, especially to the men around her.
Or maybe that was just her way, and I was over thinking everything. I never bothered to ask her.
“When I grew up,” I finally said, “religion never played a role in any of my relationships or friendships. You just either liked someone or you didn’t. You never considered asking anyone about their religion. It just didn’t matter. Nobody cared. If they were religious, we just assumed they practiced their faith quietly and privately. I don’t know how to stress this to you; it JUST...DIDN’T...MATTER. But now, it seems religion has become society’s hot topic; a huge issue, and somehow, in some way, there’s always a Muslim component to the introduction of the issue, the debate and the inevitable argument.”
“Muslims embrace their faith. Is that wrong?” she asked.
“No, that’s great, but they don’t always have to make it an issue. Celebrate your faith in silence and private. No one’s stopping you from doing so.”
There was silence between us for a couple of seconds.
“Let me ask you this,” I finally said, “By definition; are you a good person if you’re a practicing Muslim?”
She looked at me, a puzzled look on her face.
“Does embracing the Muslim faith automatically make you a good person?”
“What are you getting at?” she asked.
“The reality of life – our existence. Becoming a devoted Catholic or Christian doesn’t automatically make me a good person. If I’m an asshole, or someone who is inclined to do bad, my faith really doesn’t change anything. As a matter of fact, in a lot of cases, I can hide behind that in order to fool people that I’m something better than I really am.”
“What’s this got to do with anything?” she asked.
“There are no absolutes in life. Whether we like it or not everyone is different, with our own ideas and quirks. Hopefully the majority of us are generally good people; living good, decent lives, caring for our loved ones and children, and trying, despite all of our limitations to do what’s right. Whether we like it or not, in the long run, we all do a little bad too. Whether you cheat on something, tell a little white lie, or just have thoughts that would be considered horrible if people really knew what you were thinking. That’s human. Religion tries to remove all those shades of grey and dumbs it down, making everything absolutes. If you don’t believe what I believe, you’re wrong and you’re going to Hell. And the beauty part of it all is that nobody here on earth really knows anything about anything. What lies beyond, after death – Shakespeare’s undiscovered country? No one knows, no religion knows.”
“You once mentioned that you believe your parents moved on,” she said.
“I believe that we move on to another existence, yes. They’ve embarked on a new adventure, yes. That’s what I choose to truly believe. Why? Because it brings me comfort. It took a horrible situation and brought me some comfort within it, because if it is truly accurate, that means that one day, I don’t know when, I’ll have a chance to see and speak with my parents again. Do I know it to be true? I haven’t the foggiest idea; for all I know it’s some romanticized version of death I’ve worked up in my mind that has absolutely no bearing on anything about life and death. But I choose to believe it; I can’t prove it though? We’re all looking for comfort in life, Safia, which actually brings up another question. I really don’t know anything about the Muslim religion. I imagine it’s beautiful in its own way, and I imagine like all good religions, it preaches peace, love and understanding between people...”
She was watching me intently, not sure where I was going with this.
“...which, if you ask me is a great thing. I’m behind any religion that preaches peace, love and understanding. But because it has become an issue; because there’s a constant demand that we change our ways here in the Western world to accommodate their ways, or their beliefs, the Muslim religion comes off as a religion surrounded by anger.”
She just looked at me.
“Even on the radio, when there’s a debate around a Muslim issue, inevitably there’s always someone phoning in, some man, who is ranting and raving; I haven’t been paying attention to this for long, it’s always been background chatter to me, but my perception in listening to the issues and how they’re addressed on both sides, is that some think we’re in the middle of a religious war; there is so much anger conveyed in relation to the Muslim religion, or at least that’s what I perceive, that it’s taking away from the beauty of the religion. That’s why I believe we all have to just practice our beliefs in private, pass them on to our family members, and hope they embrace the same. If they don’t, well, that’s life; we’re not all going to think the same, ever.”
“Interesting,” she said, as she got up from the table and moved to the coffee pot to pour herself another cup.
“I believe in a higher power, but I refuse to confine that higher power to just one religion. What do you believe?” I asked.
Safia moved back to the table and sat down; she seemed to be thinking, somewhat lost in her own head.
“I was raised in the Muslim faith,” she finally said. “As a young girl, I read the Koran and even recited from it. It was beautiful. My parents were so proud. As I got older, like my sister and brother, I stopped going to the Mosque with my parents. You know teenagers, there’s always something more important that needs to be done. Along the way, I guess I’d moved away from the faith. Not that I no longer believe in it, just life took over, and I haven’t really thought about it much, until now. This whole blow up with my parents, that’s brought up some questions; brought religion back to the forefront, and I don’t know, I just don’t know what I think or should think.”
That was honest. She obviously was conflicted, and while I felt for her, that was a good thing; it meant that things mattered to her.
“Here’s what I do know, Safia,” I said, reaching across the table and taking her hand in mine. “I love you. And no matter what, no one is going to tell me that’s wrong. Ever. I love you, and that’s my religion; that’s what I believe in – love.”
She smiled back at me. “I love you, too,” she said.