Meagan & the story of coming home

Saturday, March 23 at 9:50pm, Meagan died in a car accident. Maybe she swerved right to miss something -- the police think it might have been a deer -- corrected the wheel to the left and crashed into a tree. It went right through the drivers' side door and crushed her so badly that they wouldn't be able to make her look like herself. Her friend, Brittany, lived long enough to tell the police officer their names and then she also passed away. I hope Meg died instantly. I hope the fear and confusion she felt while swerving were replaced by a flash of all the love she had ever given and received in her life before her essence split into a million particles of energy and found peace.

I was sleeping when it happened. I woke up early Sunday morning to Skype Hattie, but Andrea was on Facebook chat and told me I had to call home. I thought it was strange that both her and Mum were online at 5am Canadian time. The urgency of her messages concerned me. They wanted to know if I was alone. I was. My immediate worry, if it was something bad, was that something had happened to Dad or my grandparents. It didn't occur to me that anything could happen to Meagan. She was supposed to be invincible. Mum said later that maybe she had used up her nine lives already and we hadn't known it.

Mum told me about Meagan in the same tone of voice as she had used to tell me about Grandma Marie's death when I was 7. The violence with which I began to cry was overwhelming. I couldn't get words out of my throat, it hurt so badly. My door was wide open and my roommates had been asleep. Sissoko came in and I choked out what had happened. Maybe the universe was trying to send me some sort of "comic relief". Sissoko would definitely be the character used for laughs in the sitcom of my life, if it ever happened. He told me that this was "hard" (dur), like me, and that I would have to accept it. Morgane came in next and held my hand. Alex was last and was so horrified, he couldn't really say anything and had to leave after a few minutes. My friend Maddy came over, as she had planned to do in order to Skype Hattie, and I just fell into her arms.

Mum and Andrea had contacted Danielle, hoping she would make it to my apartment before I called home. When she arrived, it was such a relief not to have to tell her. I told Hattie over Skype why I couldn't call her. She passed the message on to a few people and became the source of information for everyone that I left behind, which was a blessing because it gave people in France an opportunity to send me their best wishes after I left. I called my parents again -- I had decided to leave on the earliest flight possible, but they convinced me to leave Tuesday morning instead so that I could settle everything before I left. Alex made coffee and said he knew I didn't drink coffee, but he didn't know what else to do. I booked my flight home in "Premium Economy" which was cheaper than regular economy, but we had no idea what it meant. Danielle helped me cancel hotels and other things, which was really just something to do. She insisted that I take a shower.

The running water covered the sounds of my grief.  I don't know how long I stayed there lamenting how much Meagan had looked up to me and every single possible thing I could think of. My body was wracked with pain. It wasn't in my chest, like I would have imagined, it was all in my throat, but I could feel it everywhere. I needed my family. Picturing the scene of my Mum opening the door for the cops, Andrea coming downstairs after Dad when Mum said it was bad. Mum yelling out, "Is she dead?!" and the cop answering yes. My family collapsing, literally and figuratively, and sitting down on the steps behind the front door. We are no longer the same people.

I hugged Meagan before she left for move-in day at Humber as if I would never see her again. She almost left without hugging me, but I called her back and held her in my arms because I was leaving and I knew I wouldn't see her for seven months. I was being over-the-top, just to be silly, kissing her on the cheek a few times. I didn't realize I would never hold her again. I can confidently say the last words we said to each other face-to-face were "Love you", but it hurts that I can't remember the last time I saw her on Skype. I messaged her on Facebook chat a few days before it happened, and we were making plans to see each other when I got home.

Eventually I had to pull myself together enough to wash and dry myself off. It turned out that letting it out like that helped me pull it together for most of the day. I started packing, I participated in a carnival in our neighbourhood with Danielle and my roommates dressed in random things,

I ate dinner at Arthur and Louise's (broccoli soup which was just about the best comfort food ever), I watched Django Unchained with Danielle and showed her photos of my family. I asked her to stay overnight.

On Monday, I closed my bank account, I finished packing, I had Olga over for a picnic lunch, I printed my flight information, Alex and Morgane cleaned the kitchen, Morgane spoke to the residence concierge, I had tea with Olivier and my other friend Morgane (who baked me chocolate chip muffins), I met with Quentin to say goodbye and told him through tears what had happened, he convinced me to come to Club Rock later to say goodbye, I informed the International Department of my departure, I bought souvenirs and went up to Fourvière hill with Danielle, Jack and Jamie made us pancakes for dinner and brought us Ferrero Rocher (even though they didn't know), and I went to Club Rock and said goodbye to Adrie and Mathieu after dancing a few last rounds with my favourite partners.

That night, Danielle and I stayed at her host family's house in Chapponay and watched music videos. She made me toast with peanut butter and bananas. When we turned out the lights, I tried not to cry while thinking about how long it would be before I would see my family.

In the morning, we dropped off the girls at school, grabbed almond croissants from the local award-winning bakery, and made it to the airport. We had to adjust my bags to even out the weight and then we hugged for a million years before I went through security. I cried in the waiting area and couldn't focus on the children's book Olga had given me as a gift.

The first plane ride was hell. For an hour and a half there were no movies and not enough space to read. There was an empty seat between me and another man who must have been uncomfortable with my attempts at silent grief and the quantity of toilet paper wads I had used to blow my nose building up on my lap. I brought a whole roll with me, just in case. I think maybe grief is the attempt to give out all of the love you intended for the person you lost, through tears. I think the pain you feel is really the sensation of so much love leaving you that it hurts -- or maybe so much love coming to you from the dispersed energy of your loved one that you can't handle it. During the layover I tried to call home and couldn't get through, texted Danielle, called Hattie for a long chat and ate loads of chocolate.

Four hours later, I boarded the long flight looking rather rough, to put it nicely, in my plaid shirt and green toque. The air hostess smiled at me when she looked at my ticket and I couldn't tell if she was genuinely smiling, doing it as part of her job or if she was inwardly laughing at the incongruity of my appearance and my seat number which was practically the front of the plane, almost First Class. I was backwards next to the window with a divider between me and the guy next to me in a reclining seat. Am I ever grateful for that! I tried to distract myself by reading, watching movies, eating, whatever, but I knew I couldn't attempt sleeping because my thoughts all made me weak. A few times I snuck into the bathroom to have out a proper cry while everyone else was sleeping.

The thought that Meagan might have been wearing the "sisters" necklace when she died, the one that I gave her for a recent birthday, set me off for ages. And the thought of being with my family was a constant trigger. It was painful because I knew it could never be my whole family and also because I couldn't get to them any faster. I imagined her death all the possible ways. I didn't really know any details at that time. Maybe she had been awake, in shock, thinking about us while lying in the ditch, so scared before she passed into darkness or maybe it had been instant and she hadn't had a chance to feel or think anything. I hurt for my family who were hurting. I tried to get off the plane slowly, because we had landed early, but I was only fourteen rows back and there were hardly any people in that section of the plane to wait for. I texted my Mum. They were half an hour away. Without trying, I made it quickly through customs and my bags were some of the first ones off the plane. I waited for a while on a bench in arrivals.

Normally, Meagan would have been the first one to find me. She would have been miles ahead of my parents and while I was watching for them, I mistook another woman for her. In the span of half a second, I went from feeling total elation to being crushed by sorrow and grief. I really need glasses. I pulled out my toilet paper and cried openly. The people next to me must have thought I'd been forgotten ... or that I was unstable. I saw my cousin Rachel and my Uncle Jeff and called out to them, but they went in the other direction. There was nothing for it: I put on my massive backpack, tied my coat and purse around my suitcase and rolled up behind my family. I barely managed the words, "Hey strangers" before we were all in tears hugging each other. Andrea and I hugged like our lives depended on it -- and they did. We promised to get tattoos for Meg.

My Dad was coughing, trying not to cry and saying "I call bullshit!". We must have felt almost relieved, but there is no relief in grief. Everything is only slightly better than the worst. I have no words for how it felt to see my Mum. In fact, that whole moment of seeing them all was only love. We laughed because the people around us must have thought that no one was happy to see me, we were all crying so hard. The range of emotions that can be elicited by grief doesn't fit in the Hollywood narrative.

I felt a sense of peace on the ride home that I hadn't felt since Sunday morning. The whole flight, I had been thinking, "Please get me to the ground safely", and my parents had been thinking, "Please get us to the airport safely". Being together made it easier. Andrea and I took sleeping aids and decided to sleep in the same bed.

*****

It started before I got out of bed -- people were at our house to pay their respects, bringing baked goods and casseroles and food, telling about their own lost loved ones, trying to offer comfort where there was none. The whole week was spent looking for silver linings, but every one we found was a paradox -- all of this potential happiness was only possible as a result of Meagan's death. Mum said that Meagan would have said, "At least...".

We looked through all of our old photos and laughed through tears. We chose photos for the visitation. People shared stories about Meg we'd never heard. We were receiving upwards of 20 cards a day. We felt like Vernon Dursley with the Owl Post, waiting for the weekend when there would be no piles of letters to open. Andrea chose music for the visitation. My high school friends came to support me. Saturday, twelve hundred people came to see us. I saw my friends from St Catharines and Milica, who drove from Windsor with her father to hug me and give me a card signed electronically by my friends in France and around. I met Meagan's friends from Humber, saw her childhood friends and her ex-boyfriend. Apart from that, the day was a blur. We were running on adrenaline and hugs. We were numb. No one could say anything to make it better, they could only love us and that they did. Sunday, our house was quiet and there was time to think. I wrote my eulogy.

On Tuesday, we put on our purple, Meg's favourite colour (almost everyone at the visitation wore purple and they had hosted a purple day at the high school in honour of Meg and Brittany), and drove to the funeral home. We cried when we walked in, just as we had when we'd walked into the visitation. If our home was overflowing with flower arrangements, it was sparse in comparison to the chapel. My Aunt said it felt like Meg's wedding. And it was. It was all of her important events rolled into the visitation and the funeral. My Uncle Brian did the service. I had raised my eyebrows at the built-in tissue box holders for the pews, but when it started, I didn't think they were so silly. I didn't want it to end, because that meant time hadn't stopped and we would have to continue on. Talaira and Andrea sat on either side of me. The funeral home gave us angel pins to wear with our purple ribbons. Eventually, I had to take the stand:

"Whenever someone in our family jokingly said something like “You’re crazy” or “You’re weird”, my smart-aleck answer was always “I practice on Tuesdays”. No one but Meagan thought this was funny.

As a big sister, you’re expected to be the role model, the one that is looked up to. I thought I was living up to this expectation by doing well in school, being involved in clubs and being “easy” on my parents, most of the time. Meagan thought it was a big secret that she wanted to be like me.

But I’ve realized that Meagan was the real leader in our family. Ron Hubbard said: “To love in spite of all is the secret of greatness. And may very well be the greatest secret in this universe.”

Meagan loved everybody no matter what they put her through. She had to work hard to follow in my footsteps for all of those things that I thought were important, but love came naturally to her.

Reading through all the messages that have been left for Meagan, I’ve realized what an incredibly giving person she was. Everyone remembered her as the friend who was willing to reach out to people who didn’t yet have any one. Mum always said that because of her ADD, Meagan wore her nerves on the outside. She felt love more intensely and more deeply than anyone else, and so she gave love the way she felt it.

On Tuesdays and every day, I’ll practice to be the kind of person she was. I aspire to be compared to Meg, my role model for a life filled with love."

My voice cracked half-way through and I had to take a break to hug my Mum (her hugs are magic) before I could continue, through tears. Mum followed. Uncle Brian concluded with a section of her obituary that Mum had written and we played a DVD of one of her dance solos. Everyone left in tears. It was the perfect tribute to an amazing girl. We took home some of the flowers and reconvened at our house for a party in her honour.

*****

As life has resumed this past month, it has been the hardest. There has still been a ton of business to attend to and letters and visitors have still been coming, but everyone else's lives have been continuing. No one has forgotten about us, but we're finding that we have to learn how to keep living, too. We watched Andrea dance her first solo, called "Home":

and she has gone back to school. Some days, I am fine -- others, the smallest things can set me off. A photo, something I want to tell her, the date... I am never prepared for those moments. We cleaned out Meg's room at Humber and donated most of her clothes. We found the necklace that I had remembered on the plane and now Andrea wears it. That was a hard day. All of our favourite photos, most of which we had put into the slide show for the visitation or had put in frames around the house, were also her favourite photos. She had them hanging everywhere in her dorm room. Her door was covered in tributes from her friends there. She was having the time of her life at Humber. She was just coming into her own and really being appreciated for what a thoughtful, loving person she was.

I've finally started to experience some of the reverse culture shock they told me I'd go through, but I didn't really have a chance to settle into "normal", everything happened so quickly, and so maybe I won't really notice the things that have changed about me for a while. Most days, I don't even want to go in public. Music and television shows and movies all seem to speak to our pain in some way. There's something to be said for wearing black as you mourn. It's really hard when you come across someone who doesn't know what you're going through, because it's not possible to say it to them, to explain why you don't feel "normal".

Through all of this, I feel that it's necessary to have a grateful heart. So many people love us. We know Meagan knew that she was loved. We have had nothing but support and empathy from those around us since this began. None of this can fix anything, but it helps us to bear the hurt as much as it can.

Now when I'm asked, "How are you?", I can honestly reply, "As good as I can be."

Hug your family for me.
Much Love to You and Yours,

Tessa

 Thank you everyone who has taken the time to support our family by reading this post and to remind themselves of the wonderful woman that Meagan was.
I'm including some additional tributes here, as well as some writings I have done more recently about my experience with grief and mental health.
Being Depressed in Europe - July 2016

Meagan's Obituary - I'm biased but this is the most beautiful obituary I've ever read, and my mom is an inspiring writer.