Defining Death

Sitting in the backyard, Jean holds her sobbing granddaughter. The little black kitten's lifeless body in front of them. For days Jean and Amelia tried to nurse the tiny rejected kitten to health but in the end it was too sick. Jean thought probably why the mother had rejected it in the first place. That knowledge would not help the five year old as she looked at Jean with her deep blue eyes, a stray curl stuck to her wet cheek. Amelia asks why and as Jean is about to answer with all the phrases she has used or heard in the past, she thinks. Why?

The first time Jean met death up close she was thirteen. Grandmum was late for morning tea something that had been occurring more frequently as the woman aged. Jean bustled into the room and instantly knew that this morning was different. Stillness and silence filled the room. She didn't need to go to the bed to know, but she did anyway. Sitting down beside this treasured woman, tears were shed and a prayer whispered. The stillness broken by Jean's mother calling for them. Jean hardly remembered the days that followed. The death was not unexpected or frightening. The peacefulness of those few moments stayed with Jean for years.

The next death wasn't peaceful or expected. Her days had been filled with such joy and excitement. Six months gone, her stomach was well in front of her. The baby kicking at her all through the night. The afternoon was to be like any other. She was preparing a simple lunch so Christopher could return to the fields quickly. It started with a dizziness that washed over her. Before she could even sit down, the nausea hit and a sharp pain across her back. If she could just lie down she would feel better in a moment. The rest happened so fast. Before she knew it Christopher had scooped her up off the kitchen floor and put her in the truck. It was a girl. Those are the only words she remembers the doctor saying. Christopher never told her if more was said but it didn't matter. Death had showed its ugly face.

Death takes so many forms. In an instant it can change everything. A few solemn words from the doctor and mother is gone in weeks, never to see her second grandson. Heart attack in the fields, and the family farm is sold. A knock on the door by an officer and a widow is made. One last stroke, and Lucien stays. A phone call, so many phone calls, a fall and life changes again.

Why? Jean looked deeply into Amelia's eyes and told her the truth as Jean believed it to be. "If we didn't have death we couldn't cherish the life. If we never lose people or things we love, we would never understand the depth of that love. It's not easy to understand but with each loss we value the ones that remain with us." On that warm afternoon, the little kitten wrapped in an old dish towel is buried under the Gold Tooth Aloe. With a kiss to Amelia's brow Jean returns to the comfort of her kitchen. Death shaped Jean Blake but she will not let it define her.