The Flo Jo Theory

 As I have told you all before, I am ASTOUNDED that I am not one of those people who is completely unphased by death. I spent my childhood handing out with my old grandma and her old friends at a senior independent living facility. Someone she knew was always dying. And it was never really a sad occasion. Grandma and her friends would hear the news about someone who died in their sleep or had a heart attack, and they'd shake their heads, talk about what a shame that was, and go back to their ceramics. Being in that environment, I was completely death-jaded. It just felt like something you did, like picking up groceries or washing your clothes. 

Now, as I slide into middle age, I feel like I am as mature about death as I should have been then. When the avalanche of death hit my family, I was confused and irritated as if death was yet another subscription service that I didn't want to be a part of but was enrolled in. Yet as we know, death is not Hello Fresh, it's a scary, inevitable thing. 

That brings me to Ms. Nadine. She was a 40-something year old woman who attended my church. I e-met her during the pandemic when we were all going to church via Zoom. She was in my prayer group and was a very nice, perky lady. She was a mother and a caregiver to her mother who had Alzheimer's. And this woman had a heart for God. The joy she had after she got baptized. Let me tell you, you could feel the sunshine in her eyes through the computer screen. There was no way you could tell that she was in horrible, excruciating pain, but she was. One minute, she mentioned that she had bad stomach pains during a prayer call. Soon after that, I prayed with her about it in the wee hours of the morning. She was in so much pain, she couldn't sleep. Soon after that, she found out that she had stomach cancer that was spreading. We all prayed for her. She prayed on her own. Her family prayed. She died a couple of weeks ago. 

She was in a lot of pain after a long time of chemo treatments. The last time I saw her was Easter, and she had lost so much weight that I didn't immediately recognize her. Look, I get that people die. That I will die. That the people I love will die. But what I can't wrap my mind around is the attitude about death that the Christians in my life have. 

"I just called to tell you that Ms. Nadine has lost the race," my spiritual mentor told me. I honest to God didn't know what she was talking about. Then at church during a dedication the prayer group put together, the attitude was that she had now won the race because she was Jesus. It took everything I had not to boo my minister. Won the race? I think that Ms. Nadine would have liked to be healthy and alive to live and spend more time with her family, not pulling a Flo Jo in an imaginary sprint! I mean, what is wrong with people?! 

I am having hard time with people. Ms. Nadine was a sweetheart who is dead. Meanwhile, there is some pedophile serial killer out there on a beach vaykay and living his best life. It seems to get more confusing for me with each death of a loved one that I experience. I am not sure what to do. I guess I should keep a bag packed with sweats and a pair of Nikes, just in case I myself have to make a spiritual run for it. 

Mortified

I have been pretty scared a few times in my life. One time that stands out in my mind happened when I was an undergrad student in New Orleans. I had gone to a parade with my friends and I was NOT in the best of moods. I was so immature back then. If I was unhappy, everyone had to be unhappy. So, eventually, my mood was so fowl that me and my friends decided to leave and go back to campus soon after the parade was over instead of hang out. Slow dragging behind my friends in a black hoodie with my lip poked out, I heard a man talking about how fat I was to his friend. I turned around and they both laughed, so I shot them both the finger. They stopped laughing, and the tall one who had made the remark motioned in his jacket the way that gangsters do in movies when they have a gun.
My heart started pounding so hard I could hear it over the band playing in my ears. I started to walk quickly, dipping in and out of the crowd, only to look behind me to see that the dudes were pissed and hot on my trail. I sped up, which should tell you how young I was. I am so out of shape now that, if this would have happened yesterday, I would have just stood there and taken the bullet before I tried to run from it.
I dipped behind a float alongside the train tracks. From my position, I was able to see the thugs racing down the street looking for me. And just when I thought I couldn't get even more scared, I saw the man who called me fat turn my friend Tiesha around quickly. I held my breath thinking, Oh God, please don't let this moron shoot my friend over something stupid I did. He looked her up and down, realized she was not me, then continued on the hunt. When we got to campus alive and safe I was so happy that I collapsed on my bed and screamed in my pillow. My mouth had gotten me in tons of trouble before, but that was a close call.
I say all this to say that this weekend I ran into an older woman in my life. She has been diagnosed with colon cancer and is doing chemo to shrink the tumor so that it can be removed. She got so upset while telling me about her treatment and her infusions that she started crying. I gave her a hug and that is when I felt it. This woman was not scared, she was mortified. This far surpassed the mere fear I felt when I thought that I was going to get gunned down in the Big Easy. Hugging her, I could feel the nervous energy bouncing around in her body. She was trembling and secreting a panic that sat in the air, making it warm, thick, and uncomfortable. You could literally smell her anxiety. I felt that if she could have, she would have screamed.
What could be scarier than knowing you are going to die or having good reason to think that you might? What could be more agitating than going over the list of things you want to do and get done over and over in your head? Is it possible to even explain in words the fear of not knowing what the afterlife holds in store for you and if you are spiritually ready to find out?
I thought these things as she left to go run errands. As someone who is often afraid to go after what I want in life, she helped me to remember that there are worse things than being scared.