Forget Me Not

I died two deaths that year; once when my heart stopped beating, and again when the sound of my voice became nothing more than a distant memory to the people I thought would love me forever.

As living, breathing beings who have never known a time in which our lungs weren’t taking in air and our eyes not looking for a clock to tell us how long we’ve been doing so, it’s only natural to wonder what comes after.

Where do we go when our earthly forms finally decide to fail us and the last words that slip from our mouths become the epitaph on our gravestones?

What does the universe do with all of our unfulfilled dreams and unlived moments?

How long will your family cry for you?

Did any of them really love you like they said they did?

How long will they keep the wilting roses on the kitchen counter before they throw them (along with their memories of you) away for good?

Will your last words go down in history like that of the greatest before you, or will you fumble over your final chance to make yourself someone special in this world full of mediocre departures? These were all of the things that went through my head as well at one point. These were the very thoughts that kept me awake at night until one, dreary winter’s day when I came across a time machine that made me realize being remembered isn’t always what you hope it to be.

“In Loving Memory”, I read on the side of a tombstone marked with my name, birthdate, and death date. How cliché. If only three words were allowed to be used to describe the kind of person I am long after I’m gone, I would certainly choose anything over “In Loving Memory”. I was fun-loving, even witty some would say, I won three championship tennis titles in my twenties and had a husband and four amazing kids, yet a piece of concrete, some overused phrase, and a shabby spot at the corner of the local cemetery is all that survives me? I shake my head for a moment and proceeded to kick the stupid roses at the foot of my grave, already beginning to wilt. “This is it?”, I think. “I spent my entire lifetime trying so hard to do things that made me worth remembering only to be given the same treatment as all of the other dead people here”. Angry, I think back to when the time machine allowed me to catch a glimpse of my own funeral.

The words “she was a good person”, kept ringing in my ears like a freight train. My own sister, the one woman who knew everything about me, the woman who cut all my hair off in fifth grade and taught me how to drive, only had those measly words and an over-exaggerated story about our childhood to say about my passing. Not to mention she chose to tell about the time when she saved me from falling in a well at our grandparents’ house in the countryside. Whoever said funerals are for living was right. By the time the funeral had ended and everyone had discarded their barely-damp tissues and wiped their nearly-dry cheeks to go back out in the world and continue on living without me, I realized something that I don’t think I’ll ever come to terms with. As I stood there, alone, with the overwhelming scent of roses, lilies, and carnations invading my senses, I realized that no matter who you were, what you did, or how well-liked you were, we’ll all reach a point where we’re forgotten. Maybe if you’re lucky, that will be a long time away, but none of us can escape it. Maybe if you’re really lucky, some pieces of you will live on long after you’ve left this world, like the works of Shakespeare or Van Gogh. The thing is, we all want to be remembered, but we far too often forget that everyone worth remembering us is too consumed with cultivating how they’re going to be remembered too, leaving us to cross our fingers and hope that the sound of your name still stirs their heart long after you’re gone.

Standing at my tombstone again, I turn around to hear the sound of crisp October leaves crunching under winter boots and the sound of familiar voices coming my way. My mom and sister approached the stone with such a cautious air that you’d think they were afraid the ground would fall out beneath their feet and send them alongside me for a deep sleep six feet under. They looked back and forth from the stone to one another, and tears welled up in their eyes. After a couple minutes, Mom placed some fresh roses at my grave and then they both turned to leave, hand in hand, crunching leaves as they went.

That was the last time they would visit me over the course of ten years.

With the time machine allowing me to speed up and slow down time at my will, I went through and counted each person that visited my grave in the months after my death.

15....

7....

2...

0.

           After seven years, the only things who came to visit me were the crows and the lawn mowing man on Sundays. People were already starting to move on with their lives, meeting different people, loving different things. They found living beings to befriend, beings who were just a little bit more memorable than me I guess.

I bet nobody will tell them how unpopular you become once your heart stops beating.

I bet nobody thinks they’ll ever die twice.

But as I sit here, watching a crow peck at the mildewing piece of stone that only reads half of my name now, I realize that I’m experiencing death all over again.

Nobody ever tells you that dying is so much worse the second time around.

           Turning off the time machine, coming back to the present moment and once again a living human, I stop to wonder how I’ll make the rest of my time here on earth memorable. I think about entering crazy contests like I see on tv and being known as “that woman I saw on television once”. I think about going back to school, getting that Ph D in history I always wanted before kids and a husband entered my life, and being remembered as “that accomplished woman I once knew”. But as I walk toward my window and look out to see a crow pecking at a tree branch that had fallen from the heavy thunderstorm yesterday, I start to think that it doesn’t even matter. The only thing that truly matters in this life is living it to the fullest before you’re just another name engraved on the side of a rock at the corner of your local cemetery.