“Son, I have some very sad news to tell you.” While my father gathered the courage to announce the endless pain, I plunged into emptiness and found despair. “Your mother died.”
Mother. Died. Just the combination of words that could not occur – mother should be synonymous with eternity. But mine hadn’t been alive for 12 hours – twelve hours that I spent living, traveling, drinking, walking, laughing. I lived immeasurably while those who gave me life died.
I enjoyed the South African summer, but my world had already ended. My family was in pieces and, desperate, they tried to find me an ocean away. This happened a decade ago, when intercontinental messages didn’t travel via apps and smartphones were distant dreams.
Almost 10 years, huh, mom? Longing.
Since then, I’ve traveled more, always overcoming the fear, that’s the name, that takes over me every time I leave home – I don’t know anyone who works while traveling who is more afraid of traveling. Even so, I lived abroad, traveled the world, started writing about tourism and telling stories from overseas.
See too:
• It is necessary to keep a close eye on these disobedient gentlemen
• Masked! Look around, there’s another mask behind you
• The incredible generation that gives alcohol gel baths in the alcohol gel jar
• In times of pandemic, a little fear never hurt anyone
Writing became my entire life, but that was the only story I didn’t tell. I preferred to keep you all to myself. If I now violate the secret, it is not because of the passing of the decade, although time helps to accommodate the pains in the corners of the soul. I tell you because I’m afraid.
At a time when so many die, I fear losing mine; At a time when life is worth so little, I am filled with terror when I realize the infinite love I carry in my chest. And how much I have to lose. If the pandemic burdens us with fears, empathy fills our hearts with the pain of others. Rarely has pain been so simultaneous and, at the same time, so lonely.
Veríssimo wrote about the irony that no one will be present at the most important social occasion in life: the wake itself. We won’t know who went and who was absent, who cried non-stop and who went out for a cup of coffee. The coronavirus era puts an end to the problem, but in reverse. Now neither the dead nor the living go to wakes, which no longer exist.
And they shouldn’t even exist, since crowds can take even more people to the other world – the virus doesn’t respect mourning. But assuming this does not resolve the sadness of loss without hugs, without collective crying, goodbyes, last words next to the coffin. Without the remorse and apologies.
Jokes, untimely pranks and the recovery of family memories also disappear, which, albeit timidly and prematurely, begin to emerge there. And that up front they will conclude their mourning. The farewell can be televised – and that is how it has been around the world – but, who would have thought, avatars cannot replace human beings. And even here, inequality shows itself: organizing an online wake is a middle-class privilege.
The pandemic even puts an end to the last seconds with the family before returning to the dust, during the carrying of the coffin to the grave, now carried out by burial men in astronaut clothes. And this is when it allows a grave, an eternal private home, lying with our ancestors.
There are cases, less rare than we would like, in which the terror of mass graves, cold storage rooms, and piles of bodies prevails. The collapse of health is also that of dignity.
When my mother passed away, I discovered that there is fear after death: that of not being there in time to say goodbye.
Bus, taxi, sleepless night in hotel, nightmare. “My God, it wasn’t a dream, my God.” Taxi, airport, plane, another one, bus, change airport, last boarding, disembarking, pick up your bags. Thirty-six hours passed before I could finally cry with my family. There was time – and every day I am grateful for that.
So far we have lost 20 thousand lives, but this number does not describe suffering. And there is no greater pain than suffering without goodbye.
Also read: I learned that living among ghosts is better than living without them
