Atlanta Death Café

While living in Atlanta, I regularly attended meetings of the Atlanta Death Café (ADC), which were held almost monthly at the famous Oakland Cemetery. People are easily spooked by the subject of death. As a result, I try and not broach the subject unless it comes up in conversation.

Death to most people is a difficult thing to accept---which is odd---since many things in life are tied to death.

Jon Underwood, the London founder of Death Café began the Death Café movement to encourage open conversations about death and dying. He felt it should be done with snacks, cake, and coffee or tea, and where people could talk openly about why most of us fear death.

At the ADC, I met lots of wonderful people from all walks of life; some grappling with the loss of a loved one, others in the death industry such as hospice care, and others waiting on the death of a loved one. There was always an ice-breaker to get the discussions going. We formed groups where each person in the group talked about death from their perspective. The statement which encouraged a one word answer on the topic was “to me, death is:______.”

My fill in the blank word is PEACE. I refuse to believe that death is worse than the things that must be endured while struggling through this quagmire called LIFE.

As a lover of quotes, I have found that the most profound quotes deal with death.

The English writer/poet DH Lawrence has a great quote about death that reads: “When I want to move, I remember death.”

Makes perfect sense to me because the subject of death conjures up many stories that are tied to life.

Another writer kept on his desk a plaque that read simply “remember death,” undoubtedly used as a touchstone when suffering from writer’s block.

Lately, my favorite quote is:

"Life asked death, 'Why do people love me but hate you?'

Death responded, “Because you are a beautiful lie and I am a painful truth.'"

By far the most ominous quote I’ve read is:

"Death twitches my ear.

'LIVE,' he says. 'I am coming!'"

I’ve been asked, “Are you dying? And why are you preoccupied with death and dying? I do not think my curiosity with death is any more morbid than those of people obsessed with serial killers and forensic shows that have to do with brutal deaths in every episode. It seems people will deal with death as long as it’s not in real time. By real time, I mean living life as if you understand you will die one day.

Many years ago, colleges and universities decided to bring death into the mainstream by making it an elective—I suppose—because as a prerequisite, it wasn’t going to fly. The practice has since fallen to the wayside.

This was done to get humans accustomed to the idea that they must die one day. Still, here we are in the 21st century and most people are as ill-prepared for death and dying as they were the day they were born. Most people are not prepared emotionally, spiritually, and the least of all, financially. As a result, people are reluctant to make end of life decisions because they think to do so will hasten death.

All around us, every day, people are dying; young and old, rich and poor. Death certainly has no respect of person. There are sudden deaths and anticipated deaths. I know from experience that even when waiting on death, nothing prepares a person for when it arrives—in full regalia knocking the wind out of you.

It’s been 17 years since my mother's passing. At first, we did not know she was terminally ill. Then, a doctor gave it a name: “congestive heart failure,” he said nonchalantly!

It was the moment I knew she was not going to get better and live a long life. At 67, I felt she should have had many more years ahead of her.

I’d had her for only 43 years. Not nearly long enough.

I prayed fervently, but not for the obvious.

I did not pray for her not to die. I did not plead and beg in a feeble attempt to bargain with God or the universe. I prayed for the courage to live in a world without her in it. I knew in her dying, she would be set free from the troubles of the world as well as released from a body that had seen better days. With that came a certain peace, consolation, and most importantly, acceptance.

Still, it took five years to get through all the stages of grief and this many years later, grieving for my mother has become a part of who I am.

It was many years after my mother’s death that I started going to the ADC. Going there did not make me sad, and I never saw anyone shed a tear at a single meeting. People gathered to talk about something that is inevitable for us all. We talked, laughed, told funny funeral stories and jokes, ate death snacks, and enjoyed being around like-minded people, not afraid to talk about death and dying.

Not talking about death and dying is tantamount to not talking about the huge, pink elephant standing in the middle of the room wearing high heeled slippers.

If you think about death—really think about it—no matter how you dice it, there is a story in your life about death. The founder of Death Café was global in his thinking on death. When he died suddenly at age 44 in 2017, he had planted the seeds for death to be viewed and talked about in a way that is more life affirming than anything else. Apparently, there is a need for them because, all over the world, Death Cafés are coming to life.