Death Café or, The loss of the body

The other Monday, I was participating to a Death Café and I cried. I was not sure why. These were not tears of sadness.
Death cafés are places where strangers meet, over tea and cake, to talk about death. It sounds spooky, odd and morbid but, it is not. When we talk about death ultimately, we talk about life… and love.

When Nati took his life, his death cracked me open. He was my lighthouse and, I am left, lost in the dark. In moments of great pain and deep vacuity, I contemplate that door he left opened. From time to time, the knob is nagging at me. I am seized by dizziness.

I had this clear dream not long after he died:

We are in our respective cars, side by side, like if we were ready to engage in a race, on a dusty dirt road. No starting pistol. We drive side by side in the dust. The road becomes narrow. There is space for only one car. You speed up and pass before. I follow you. The road continues along the cliff edge of a grand canyon. You disappear ahead in a dusty cloud. The road is getting narrower. Red flags, safety barriers, construction site ahead. I have to stop. I understand I can’t follow you on that road. I get off the car, look at the horizon. A dusty point. You are no longer here. Silence. I have to stay on this side of life.

I have been struggling with the acceptance of his death because I know he is not dead. I have been struggling with guilt as well, because I can’t say I miss him.
That day, at the Death Café, a lot was said about the loss of the body. And I understood what I was missing. I miss his physicality. I miss the sound of his voice, his laughter. I miss his long silhouette in the kitchen, as he was making diner. I miss laying a kiss, on the back of his neck, while he was preparing his flight plan. I miss holding his hand. I miss his body. I mourn for the loss of his body.

I realize some of my pain is caused by the physical separation. But I know, that death is only a compartment of life.
The partition wall between life and death is as thin as a sheet of paper and, sometimes it tears up. Messages oozes through. Both ways. Synchronicities appear. I saw an arm reaching for me in the Antarctic sky. I saw a flower falling down on my laps, on a Cypriot beach. A bird kissed my nose. And sometimes, worlds meet in my dreams. The compartment is not hermetic. I know you are not dead. Only your body is.

I imagine you, the nose pressed against the window of that compartment, looking at me and trying to get my attention by all means. Paper planes with broken wings a couple of times. I’m listening like a child, with a tin can telephone pressed to my ear, hoping you are pressing the other side, to your ear too.
We are apart from each other, only by a thin sheet of paper. And, that gives me comfort.

As I walk in the streets of San Miguel, I’m thinking: You left with a piece of me. My body feels like an empty container and yet, I feel so much life and love, at the same time. When we have nothing to lose, nothing to look forward, nobody to love; we are open to life and we love everybody. This is why I cried. These were not tears of sadness.

And then, I notice on the cobblestones, two small feathers rolling all over each other, pushed by the wind. I thought of a couple, making love. A small feather and a bigger one. It could be as well, a wink from Nati. I stop and I pick them up, to save them in my wallet with all the other ones. The little things in life. These were tears of love.