Joshua Emet. S. Cuasay
I shared your memorial last year with the Daily Kos community. It was fortuitous. Your previous yearly memorials and reflections were written as Facebook Notes, which are no longer supported by them. See how quickly things come and go …
You would have been 17 this year. It was my mother who mentioned this in passing, and it left a particular mark in my mind. Most years, my reflections centered on how your passing inspired the years I spent in parish ministry, the ways that I approached sacramental theology and funeral celebrations, the effects it had on me as a parent and spouse, and how I conveyed those lessons to other parents, adults, and even activists working for social justice.
I didn’t dwell so much on the fact that you were not here with us through all of this. Had you lived, it’s quite possible we would not have had another child. We would not have your sister with us. And so heaven and earth hold our family together with one child with us and one with God.
But as I’ve seen my daughter grow into her high school years, it has come with a list of conspicuous absences. Her middle school years aligned with the Trump years, which was bad enough. Her social circle was disrupted by friends who moved away due to employment, divorce settlements, even a death in the family. Her once vibrant neighborhood cul-de-sac dwindled. There were no longer friends within walking distance or families to socialize with outside the home. And then COVID hit, and it was just the three of us sitting at home in our quiet end of the street.
I tell people that she went to her eighth-grade winter dance and then the schools shut down. She did not set foot in a school again until the start of her sophomore year. No eighth-grade clap-out. No freshman orientation and school tour. But resilient as ever, she regrouped, remained socially active, and met new people. She got invited to a number of COVID-safe outings on the way back to the new normal. When she returned to school in person, she was invited to a number of homecoming dances and sports events.
Now, roughly halfway through her high school years (how quickly things come and go), her parents look further ahead to a time when she may go even farther away. I suppose that is why this year, in particular, I do think about how much I wish you were here.
Your sister is so much better adjusted and frankly happier than I was in my high school years. Though she doesn’t present the same way, I know that for me, a lot of coming of age had to do with the loneliness that comes with teen issues of fitting in. For your sister, there is a loneliness that comes with being an only child. Many of her friends are also only children or children with much older siblings. And while having siblings around isn’t a magic wand and may not on the surface even be welcome in the high school years, it is a boon to have support at that tender time of testing the world, boundaries, and forging your identity.
We, who draw so much of how we came to be a family from our first experiences with you, wonder …wish you were here to be a part of her journey through high school and beyond. I see how she comes to life with her friends and how she brings life to her activities. I can’t help but think her world, her boundaries, her identity (and yours) could not have been anything but bigger and more expanded than they are now.
She wishes her room were bigger. (So do I). She wishes her gaming computer was faster. She wishes for a lot of things. She wishes you were here. And I wish her teen years weren’t marked by that particular loneliness and ache.
But she has made the better from it. What else can we ask of the new year to give us than for it to be better?
Thank you for being the measure of the horizon upon which we measure each passing. There are a number of relatives who passed on this year. Some sadly from COVID. A number of celebrities and icons have also departed.
Our loss is your gain.
Look kindly upon those of us here. Not just the lonely, but the sick and the struggling. And for those who wish and work for a world that is better than this.