What's all this about grief, then?

Dot Calm was one of those rare people who understand just how temporary, how ephemeral, we humans are.

She used to say, "When I die, just put me in a shopping cart." Or, "When I die, I don't want a gravestone or a memorial. I don't want anyone to know I was ever here. I don't want any trace of me left." As a result, she requested in her will to be cremated and sprinkled over the place where the Twin Rivers--the Trent and the Neuse--meet. She wanted to be cremated at the Black people's funeral parlor for stated and unstated reasons. What she said was that she wanted to support them. She was all about supporting people, especially anyone disadvantaged. Her unstated reason for being the likely lone White person at the Black people's funeral home was that it was a quirky thing to do. Dot Calm was nothing if not lovably, hilariously quirky.

She understood that, no matter what we may hope or wish, we as individuals are just not permanent. We cannot be, and we never will be.

The secret is to do as much as you can for the people around you and the world at large so that every life intertwined with yours, as every life is from the moment of our births, will be better because of you. Then sneak out the back door before anyone even knows you were there.

As you know if you read this blog regularly, Dot Calm had a wonderful, irreverent sense of humor. She didn't take life too seriously, and she didn't take herself too seriously.

And she would have wanted more than anything, as much as possible, to be celebrated rather than mourned.

With that, here's what Dot Calm would want me to post about grieving.