Happy Birthday, Dad … and Farewell
By Troy Rampy, Editor, The Wellness Blog™
“Death is not the greatest loss in life. The greatest loss is what dies inside us while we live.” — Norman Cousins
It’s been a while since I’ve posted a blog entry. A sincere thank you to those of you who noticed, and especially to those of you who contacted me with your concern.
This has been a year of loss for me. Three months ago it was my father-in-law, Paul Robert Molinari. Last month it was my father, James Troy Rampy, who would have been 90-years-old today. And three days ago it was my uncle, Aubrey Gene Rampy, who was 12 years younger than my father. An entire layer of my family’s masculine energy, role models, and leadership, gone.
I haven’t written anything since mid-March. Partly that’s about not knowing what I wanted to say … partly it’s about wondering if there was anything at all I had that was worth saying.
But here I am, writing. The problem is, I’m still not sure entirely what it is I want to say.
Allow me to simply begin by stating the obvious: there’s something about death that puts us, and our lives, into a much clearer focus. It brings with it a visceral sense of gravitas. It makes things ever so much more real.
I remember reading years ago in several of Carlos Castaneda’s books that Don Juan often mentored Carlos about living with the awareness of death … just over his left shoulder. That’s very much like the Buddhist precept of living daily with the awareness of death, of your own mortality, of your impermanence.
When we are younger, we live as if we are bullet-proof … immortal. Then as we grow older, we slowly become more aware of our own transient state. And generally with that awareness is the realization that we have a fixed amount of time. So it becomes more imperative that we get on with our lives, with our intentions, with our goals, with our purpose.
In my various career paths as a writer, producer, group facilitator, and entrepreneur, I’ve always thought that my own life’s purpose was related to how I was helping, or instructing, or guiding others. But these past few weeks have plunged me into the awareness that what I really need to do now is to simply face myself … to inhabit my own body in the present as if my very life depends on it.
And you know what? It does.
Most of us live our lives focused on others. We experience life second-hand, vicariously through them. That’s why in this culture we have so much attention on, and craziness about, celebrities. They become our cultural avatars, our game pieces, our cyber-selves.
Or we live our lives focused on “someday” … some mythic future time when we think it might all come together.
My father’s death is still not entirely real to me … I haven’t totally let it in. That’s probably because I’m not ready to let in all the feelings connected with his passing.
But one thing is certain. He is no longer with us … not on this plane anyway. And now the baton passes to me, and my brother, and my male cousins … the next generation of my family’s masculine energy.
Troy:
I take it from your comments that your Dad died. I hope that
you and your family are well. I have a quote that I have found
quite helpful. “As a flame blown out by the wind
Goes to rest and cannot be defined,
So the wise man freed from individuality
Goes to rest and cannot b defined.
Gone beyond all images –
Gone beyond the power of words.”
p. 40, “The Buddhist Handbook” by John Snelling
Troy—how beautifully said. Your dad would have loved this.
You have a wonderful way of putting things that are inside you. I did not know of Maryann’s father’s passing. When you can please give her my sympathy. Your dad loved family and
he did everything he could to leave that legacy to you and Sid.
Love you. Ellen
Troy, thank you for sharing so deeply. When our parents die, we ourselves move into the patriarch/matriarch role of the elder, and (at least in my experience) there is a certain gravity that develops in out relationship with life. Kind of a no-bullshit blinders-off sense of both the fragility and preciousness of this great opportunity. I see this in your writing, and look forward to years of sharing this one path of becomming fully human with you over the coming years……..love you, bro, Bill