I wrote a little piece for Soul Artist Journal about rites & rituals showing up in death work and how they impact our view of time. And there’s some other good writing from others in the field! You should definitely check it out. My piece is also below:
Carl is frail, forgetful and spirited. Carl is 83 years old, based on best available sources. And Carl will admit that while he is a source, he might not always be the best available. Carl is dying. That’s why I know him. I’m a regular visitor to the hospice where he’s residing.
First thing I noticed, Carl smells good. Good enough to say as much upon first meeting him.
“You smell good.”
“It’s an uphill battle in this place.”
And so Carl and I become friends.
Carl is not the type to seek out a death doula. But Carl can gab. I lost entire mornings chatting with Carl, only noticing the time when the less-than-enchanting aroma of lunch started to creep around corners, only further proving Carl’s point.
According to Carl, he’s smelled nice for longer than anyone still on this earth has known him. Beginning in his twenties, every morning, after a shower, he would spritz a bit of a Vetiver cologne on his wrists and throat. The scent is deeply ingrained in his memory – his nose habituates to it so quickly he often finds himself asking others if he’s wearing any. The smell is nice and all, but it’s the ritual that keeps him returning to it. Carl feels like himself in the moment of applying cologne.
One of the beautiful things about rituals is their ability to play with time by making certain behaviors timeless. A sip of coffee in your oldest mug before anyone else is awake. A weekly yoga session at your regular studio. A monthly card game with friends. A yearly autumn camping trip. Participating in a ritual is not an effort to “go back” to an earlier experience, but instead a chance to be in a moment that is outside of time.
When Carl applies cologne, he’s not an 83 year old man in a hospice. He’s also not a fresh faced twenty-something just out of university. He’s not a man in his early forties taking a moment before driving his daughter to soccer, or a man in his sixties, working from home, but dressed in a tie anyway. He’s Carl. An eternal Vetiver spritzer in a ritual that transcends age. All versions of Carl who have put on Vetiver are blurred together. And, for a moment, 83 year old Carl is ageless.
The next time I see Carl, there are some Tiki mugs on his bedside table, a beach ball in the corner of the room, and sunglasses missing a lens atop the TV. He assures me that he can’t see well enough to care whether the lenses are there. How very “chill” of him.
Some of Carl’s children and grandkids visited this past weekend. It was a family anniversary of some sort, but mostly an excuse to have a little party while Carl still had a little party in him. A longtime Beach Boys fan, his grandkids really leaned into the “beach” part. Despite the vibe being more Jimmy Buffet than Brian Wilson, he was rapturous about the summer shindig.
“My daughter was smart enough to bring sunscreen!”
I glanced up at the overhead lighting and then over at a palm tree cutout taped to the wall. Carl needn’t be worried about UV rays, but try finding a quicker trip to the hot, sticky beach than the smell of zinc/coconut/cocoa butter. No need to apply, just breathe in.
One last trip to the beach. A ceremony soundtracked by God Only Knows. And a new highlight in the life of an 83-year-old.
A ceremony isn’t just an occurrence, it is also a transition. Things are different going forward. There are no more beach days for Carl. A final rite of good vibrations.
Getting married, becoming an adult, joining a group – there are rites involved for each. By going through the ceremony you are signifying you have changed. You can’t go back to being a child. You can’t wake up having not gotten married.
If we see ritual as an opportunity to briefly pull ourselves “out of time”, rites and ceremonies can do the opposite. We say goodbye to the boy or girl we’ve known while welcoming the man or woman they’ve become. We say farewell to two lovers and eagerly welcome a newly wedded couple.
Often a person’s final ceremony take place after death, as a service for the grieving. But to have the chance, as Carl did, to mark an ending, a change, a transition – that is powerful. It allows both the dying and their loved ones the opportunity to say, “This is special. Things can’t be the same going forward. But this experience is part of us forever.”
A rite is an eclipse – a unique, singular and rare date. A ritual is the light of the sun – consistent, and never most notable thing about a day. Both can enrich our lives immeasurably.
Rites and rituals are ways for us to take some control of time. It will keep moving forward, but we can adjust our relationship to it. Rites can make time feel unique and rituals can make it disappear entirely. As complimentary forces, they punctuate notable times while pointing at eternity.
So in the calendar of life we can see those solar events, those days of transition. They stand out starkly from the rest. While at the same time, the sun keeps rising, a little earlier, a little later, but the same. The rite provides a jolt of energy, the ritual provides a pulse. Both keep us in touch with who we are.
Death Becomes You 