PICKING AT THE SHEETS
"PICKING AT THE SHEETS" - When I was a little girl my Daddy took me to see my Grandpa in one of those places we all avoid but may someday reside within.
Grandpa George needed the kind of care and attention that Grandma Zola was no longer able to provide so, once a week on Sundays, the family would dutifully show our love in the only way we knew how in a place where the only thing that still mattered was family.
In an attempt to avoid the sadness and boredom that permeated the room, I roamed the hallways of what we called the “Old Folks Home,” looking for something to get into. Darting in and out of other grandmas’ and grandpas’ rooms, I was, admittedly, curious about their varying states of near deadness.
In my wanderings, I began to notice something. At first, I dismissed it as a nervous habit like biting your nails or tapping your foot. Or maybe, I thought, they were knitting or believed themselves to be doing so. This unusual fidgeting wasn’t gender-specific. Like some strange old-people ritual, the manifestation revealed itself again and again in small dark rooms, in quiet, unoccupied moments. There, lying amongst the covers, with no one to bear witness, these ancient versions of myself were picking at the sheets.
I can’t tell you precisely when I realized what was going on. But I can tell you the revelation has changed forever the way I view death…and life even more.
Here’s the truth of it—For all of us, dying is a process. For those closest to the end, that process involves the body’s intuitive sensing of the spirit letting go. This “spirit-lifting” creates a sensation of floating, a detachment from the here and now both physically and mentally in great proportions. Yet, even while the spirit hungers to separate, the body wills it to remain. While the mind is still unaware of what is really happening, the act of anchoring begins and the hands, in their last attempts to grasp tightly to the things of this earth, begin their final, desperate act of holding on, of staying put, of “picking at the sheets.”
You don’t have to visit a senior center to witness this phenomenon. In fact, the “picking” is closer than you know. Think about the last time you did something with deliberation and conviction. Was it last month or even last year? Now think about the last time you felt agitated, stressed and overstimulated. In the last twenty-four hours? In the past fifteen minutes?
Isn’t it ironic that as full as our lives have become there’s a communal sensing that something’s missing?!
No matter what we do, it’s not enough. We feel displaced and detached from people and places, work, and play. Our distraction is obvious in the way we walk—our heads bent to the ground while our bodies shuffle and slouch, confirmation that our minds are on their own frantic hunt.
And how we speak—incessant, preoccupied text-messaging acronym versions of ourselves. We have dined so long on the superficial and abbreviated conversation that we’ve forgotten how to digest the richness of meaningful, authentic connection.
As our thoughts are invaded by other people’s voices, our essential selves are floating out of view.
Here is what I know—Superficial and Spirit cannot occupy the same space at one time.
We have become the generation of “pickers,” literally dying to be alive.
In our frantic attempt to fill the void, our neglected spirits have taken leave. In the stillness of the night, like the souls behind the doors of the place where Grandpa was, our souls, through abuse and neglect, have begun the ascent.
Even as we breathe, some of us have already departed—
We’ve starved the deepest part of who we really are in exchange for feeding the shallowest aspects of who we are in the day-to-day.
If you sense that something is missing in your life, there’s a good chance are you are right. But searching for it from the outside will never satisfy.
PICKING AT THE SHEETS