Death...

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Death...

Post by Hermskii » Fri Jun 07, 2019 11:03 pm

I had an Uncle pass today. He was 84. He was an old school former Marine, hard as nails and meaner than a snake who best showed love by giving you advice. If you took it, I think he felt you loved him back and if you didn't, then lets just say you might not be on his Christmas gift list for a while. He was a good man in my opinion. He treated me well and with respect. I was one of the few in my family who had skin thick enough to stay in his area for long periods of time. Yeah, it was likely only a matter of time before he was going to say something that usually pissed off people bad enough they had to get away from him. He was true to himself and had little that he was ever ashamed of.

My point to this is that I've witnessed more death recently than ever before in my life and I feel it will only get worse. They say you know you are getting old when all your friends start dying around you. At this time, I'm 51-52ish. I honestly don't know or care but I do know and care for the ones around me I have lost. Maybe this is me coping. I'm not sure. I loved my Uncle and will miss him.

I wanted to start this thread because I think it is important as a place for people to unload if needed regarding lost people in your lives. I lost my Dad when I was 6 and my Mom when I was about 41ish. Most of my friends still have both their parents and yes, I'm jealous. Call your parents, Aunts and Uncles, family. Hug them. Love them. Tell them while you still have time!

Goodbye dear Uncle . I love you.
~Peace~

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Re: Death...

Post by Dr.Flay » Sun Jun 09, 2019 1:06 am

Sorry to hear about your loss.
If I could send a hug in the post, it would be on its way.
I like those straight-talking people that say it like it is no matter what.
I know a couple of people like that. It is kind of a test "If you can put up with me, you are OK in my book", and once you get past that they are actually very different from what people think.
Usually a deep side they don't like to share with people that talk too much or ask too many dumb questions.

Yes indeed we are an ageing community and confronting mortality ever more often.
Maybe it is easier sometimes to talk about grief online, because nobody can see the tears or hear the tremble in your voice.
The official news of MrLoathsome this week has taken the wind out of me, that is for sure.
I knew the end was near but without knowing his real name or where he lived I had no way to confirm what I already knew.
It has been on my mind for the past 2 months and eaten away at me. He was part of my weekly radio show as much as the other regulars, and part of my past few years of being the night-watchman in IRC.
Finally seeing a photo of the man that I passed so much time with, but knew so little about was . .
I can't think of the words but I know Kelly had a similar feeling. Not like a punch in the guts, but it may as well have been.
BAM ! there is his face. Kind eyes and not the slightest hint of Loathsome.

Gamer-grief is a bit of a weird new territory, where we are the pioneers in a new part of Human culture and a distributed society.
We make friends we never expect to last. Why would we, after all this is just games and transient. Knowing what people look like is less important that what the behave like, so we often skip that part.
Yet dear friends here we are 20 years into this silly little hobby we share, and it turns out not to be so easy to say goodbye to people. There is always regret and unfinished business.
In the real world we have tangible memorials or reminders of the people we lost. We have somewhere to go or be together in mourning.
Out here in the digital world we don't have memorials in the same way, if at all.
Clans with a strong bond and good members can survive the passing of the clan leader, and host a memorial server or hold annual commemorative events, or even be kept alive in the form of the most badass house bot. Newbies Playground is a fine example of a clan that does not forget where it came from.

Sharing a common interest based around having fun has a remarkable ability to make people overlook many social or cultural walls.
The shared love for soccer allowed the British and German soldiers in the first world war, to suspend all hatred for 1 day and meet as equals with common desires and fears.
The thing that moved me most about that historic Christmas day in those blood soaked trenches, was that none of the soldiers had anything spare to give as presents, so ended up swapping their most personal mementos from home, such as photos of family and loved ones.
The bonds created by having fun together are so strong in social animals that it can even stop one animal from becoming prey.
In Alaska or Canada there is a group of very lucky Huskies that it would seem avoided being on the menu for Polar bears, because they went into play mode rather than flight or defence. The bears now visit their cross species friends every year, and every year bring more curious bears to meet the Huskies.

It is a strong and emotive thing that is created from shared fun and play.
When someone you get used to having fun with is gone for good, things feel very weird, unfinished and not right in a way you don't get with more personal mortality, where a funeral or grieving with others helps to say goodbye.
With family or personal friends you have others that share your pain.
With the internet there is no bar you can go and get drunk in with your friends, and when they were someone like MrLoathsome that ran such unique games, you don't have those places that you walk past and point at, with a laugh remembering all the fun you had.
Video games, are just games. They are digital and rely on an unstable internet of sites that come and go over the years. They are transient no matter how much we want to keep them.
The friendships that come from those games are something that should outlive the games.

I have just poured myself a bedtime rum (what else) so I raise my glass and drink a toast.
To your Uncle,
to MrLoathsome https://www.peoriafuneral.com/notices/Scott-Armitage
and to out-living the game.
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Re: Death...

Post by a nameless entity » Tue Jun 11, 2019 6:09 pm

Hermskii wrote:
Fri Jun 07, 2019 11:03 pm
I had an Uncle pass today. He was 84. He was an old school former Marine, hard as nails and meaner than a snake who best showed love by giving you advice. He was true to himself and had little that he was ever ashamed of.

My point to this is that I've witnessed more death recently than ever before in my life and I feel it will only get worse. They say you know you are getting old when all your friends start dying around you. At this time, I'm 51-52ish.
I wanted to start this thread because I think it is important as a place for people to unload if needed regarding lost people in your lives. I lost my Dad when I was 6 and my Mom when I was about 41ish. Most of my friends still have both their parents and yes, I'm jealous. Call your parents, Aunts and Uncles, family. Hug them. Love them. Tell them while you still have time!

Goodbye dear Uncle . I love you.
I'm sorry for your loss Herm.
You are correct. It only gets worse. I'm glad you have some siblings, and a family of your own. That helps a lot.
At one time my parents spoke of originally planning to have four kids. I know for sure that my mom lost one child, and suspected that her "lateness" one time may have been another one just getting started. Whether either of them came between my older brother and myself she could not recall. Sometimes I rather wish that they hadn't decided that two kids was enough. Now that my older brother is gone and his widow and grown family are all off doing their own thing and no longer communicating; it would have been nice to have 2 other siblings + families to talk with. I'm on my own, and it sucks.

My mother's older sister was my favourite aunt. She was a plain talker who sugar coated nothing. She outlived my mom by six years, and was 92 when she passed. She was well loved in her neighbourhood, and had a good turnout at her funeral despite outliving most of her same aged friends. She passed on a Monday morning. As usual I had called her the previous Sunday evening and we mutually expressed our "I love you's" at the end of the call. She died 10 years ago last January. Over the last decade I have been so thankful that I made that final telephone call a few hours before she left us. Sometimes when I think about it I realize that I feel more frustrated than sad. I can't talk to her any more or jump on my bike and ride the 75 miles out to her place for a visit. :(

Take Herm's advice everyone!
May peace be with you.
I'm a man........but I can change........if I have to........I guess

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Re: Death...

Post by Hermskii » Thu Jun 13, 2019 9:23 pm

I just came in from a short pleasure ride through the neighborhood. My youngest son had a birthday the other day which happens to be the day my mother passed. It has been 10 years since I lost my last parent. It does suck to not get to talk to them. For me it drives me mad because now I have so many questions for my parents. Now I'm willing to sit and pay attention. Now I'm in the same spot they were in when their kids didn't listen closely to their great stories and good advice.

I have likened losing a parent to having the one big database or hard drive that you kept everything on. Names, phone numbers, pictures, stories, memories and then having it fail with very little in the way of a backup. Pathetic comparison but accurate too.

I can't wait to see my Mom again. I did get plenty of time to tell her how much I loved her before she passed and I love that did open my heart to her long before she passed away.

Nameless, I feel so bad for you when you say you have nobody. I get what you are saying about parents and brother being gone. I know about the rest of the family doing their own thing but let me suggest that you reach out to them. My siblings and I make sure to get together each year and now the Aunts and Uncles and cousins are all starting to see the importance of the event and they are asking to join in. The more the merrier! Can you try that? Can you call some folks and line up a get together with several of them?
~Peace~

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Re: Death...

Post by a nameless entity » Tue Jun 18, 2019 6:49 pm

Hermskii wrote:
Thu Jun 13, 2019 9:23 pm

it drives me mad because now I have so many questions for my parents. Now I'm willing to sit and pay attention. Now I'm in the same spot they were in when their kids didn't listen closely to their great stories and good advice.
I have likened losing a parent to having the one big database or hard drive that you kept everything on. Names, phone numbers, pictures, stories, memories and then having it fail with very little in the way of a backup. Pathetic comparison but accurate too.

I know about the rest of the family doing their own thing but let me suggest that you reach out to them. My siblings and I make sure to get together each year and now the Aunts and Uncles and cousins are all starting to see the importance of the event and they are asking to join in. The more the merrier! Can you try that? Can you call some folks and line up a get together with several of them?
I sympathize with you on the listening to your parent's stories, but on the other hand as I look back on them now, I realize that all I ever got was an overview. More info that filled out the stories was found in saved news paper clippings and diaries, etc. Also figuring out the timelines of the various bits and pieces and how they wove together gave me better insights into my parent's lives. Compare your siblings versions of your parent's stories with your own. By working together you can weave the bits and pieces that may have only been told once, to one sibling, all together for a more complete picture.
My brother and I used to do that, and it helped.

I only had one surviving cousin from my father's side, and only ever met him twice. Once when I was 2, and once when I was a teenager.

My cousins from my mother's side are far flung and in seldom contact. One moved to New Zealand.

I might just as well come out and say it: My relationship with my brother was ..... difficult. We were just too different. We only got on well when my brother was in the mood. I had to wait for those opportunities. When things were good, they were good. When they weren't I had to wait until they were again.
In the mean time I'm hoping my nephews will smarten up and realize that I won't live forever, and know things that they will want to know.
Cards and emails sent never get any reply. In the mean time I have been writing notes and putting them with photos of ancestors so that they will know who these strangers in those saved photographs are, in case I pass before they talk to me again. Hopefully they'll go through things thoroughly when I'm gone and find those photos and notes.
I'm a man........but I can change........if I have to........I guess

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Re: Death...

Post by Hook » Wed Jun 19, 2019 3:43 pm

Don't have nuch time to reply at the moment, but I concur with you both.
Have similar experiences as some of yours.
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Re: Death...

Post by Hermskii » Fri Aug 09, 2019 10:01 pm

HOLY CRAP!

My mother in law who has lived with us the last few years had to go to the hospital because she was turning yellow. She has been on the liver transplant list for over 10 years. She died yesterday. I am devastated. Unlike most based on what I'm told, I loved my mother in law and she was awesome almost all of the time. We bumped heads every now and then but over all she was a non practicing Buddhist who was a gentle soul in my life. Her name was Naomi. DEVASTATED I tell you. More later maybe.
~Peace~

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Re: Death...

Post by a nameless entity » Sun Aug 11, 2019 2:39 pm

My sincere condolences to your wife, yourself, and your sons.
I'm a man........but I can change........if I have to........I guess

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Re: Death...

Post by Nelsona » Mon Aug 12, 2019 8:53 pm

In 2017 I dodged away from death - I was in hospital for a surgery, it could head to an infection and my countdown could start but... all was good.

Next year one of my friends has gone. He was 44 years old.

This year, in April 6, my father passed away.

What can I do ? Nothing. We are not living forever...

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Re: Death...

Post by Hermskii » Tue Aug 13, 2019 9:09 pm

Thanks Nameless. Sorry for your losses too Nelsona. Yeah, we can't live forever. I'm doing much better now that several days have passed. Easy to get teary-eyed still. Peace out all!
~Peace~

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Re: Death...

Post by EvilGrins » Fri Sep 06, 2019 6:27 pm

*hug*

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