I watched a movie the other night that I thought was a comedy. One of the characters falls in love with a man 20 years younger than her. 

It is just a week before their wedding. He leaves the house at night and starts to walk down a one-lane country road. He is struck by a truck and then taken to the hospital. They are unsuccessful at resuscitating him. 

In the film, the actor playing the dying lover is suited up with the same medical supports as Brendan was. The next scene is his wife-to-be sitting to the left of his body. She is holding his hand, unable to move, unable to say goodbye. 

Of course, this is when I lost it because my experience was so similar. 

This is the song that played during the scenes. 

A few months later she is filmed sitting with her friends and she says, "Sometimes it seems like he was never here, and sometimes it feels like he never left."

When the Party's Over

Billie Eilish


Don't you know I'm no good for you?
I've learned to lose you, can't afford to
Tore my shirt to stop you bleedin'
But nothin' ever stops you leavin'
Quiet when I'm comin' home and I'm on my own
I could lie, say I like it like that, like it like that
I could lie, say I like it like that, like it like that
Don't you know too much already?
I'll only hurt you if you let me
Call me friend but keep me closer (call me back)
And I'll call you when the party's over
Quiet when I'm comin' home and I'm on my own
And I could lie, say I like it like that, like it like that
Yeah, I could lie, say I like it like that, like it like that
But nothin' is better sometimes
Once we've both said our goodbyes
Let's just let it go
Let me let you go
Quiet when I'm comin' home and I'm on my own
I could lie, say I like it like that, like it like that
I could lie, say I like it like that, like it like that

"For Grief" By John O'Donohue

“For Grief” by John O’Donohue

When you lose someone you love,
Your life becomes strange,
The ground beneath you gets fragile,
Your thoughts make your eyes unsure;
And some dead echo drags your voice down
Where words have no confidence.
Your heart has grown heavy with loss;
And though this loss has wounded others too,
No one knows what has been taken from you
When the silence of absence deepens.

Flickers of guilt kindle regret
For all that was left unsaid or undone.

There are days when you wake up happy;
Again inside the fullness of life,
Until the moment breaks
And you are thrown back
Onto the black tide of loss.

Days when you have your heart back,
You are able to function well
Until in the middle of work or encounter,
Suddenly with no warning,
You are ambushed by grief.

It becomes hard to trust yourself.
All you can depend on now is that
Sorrow will remain faithful to itself.
More than you, it knows its way
And will find the right time
To pull and pull the rope of grief
Until that coiled hill of tears
Has reduced to its last drop.

Gradually, you will learn acquaintance
With the invisible form of your departed;
And, when the work of grief is done,
The wound of loss will heal
And you will have learned
To wean your eyes
From that gap in the air
And be able to enter the hearth
In your soul where your loved one
Has awaited your return
All the time.


“For Grief” by John O’Donohue, from To Bless the Space Between Us: A Book of Blessings (Doubleday, 2008).

Missing Brendan on July 9, 2021

I was listening to David Bowie on the way home from work yesterday. Brendan was such a huge fan of Bowie’s. We used to binge-watch a music DVD of his studio recordings and live performances that I found in our University Library’s Film and Music section. Anyway, the music transported me to these endearing memories I have of Brendan and his passionate music choices. He had such an eclectic taste. My heart ached so much as I listened to the Bowie Collection again. All my senses came alive with memories of Brendan all at once. If you’ve ever had that happen you know how painful it is.

If you never knew Brendan, I’ll describe him once again and his impression on me: Half Cartoon Character, Half Luminous Being. A unique gem of a person who you either understood or just didn’t “get”. It’s cliche but you know that saying, “They broke the mold when they made him.” I get choked up thinking that there will never be another Brendan. In one way that is good, I guess, because he will always stay unique. In fact, he was so unique that he didn’t remind me of anyone I had ever met in my life. I’ve worked on a University Campus for 23 years and have met thousands of people. I often feel like I meet the same 10 people or types of looks and personalities. But no one was or is as unique as Brendan. That’s what continues to be so painful. The nice thing about seeing Corinne and Al is that B reminds me a bit of both of them. It’s funny to me how much Brendan and Al are similar in their quirkiness. And then you see where Brendan got his heart. Without a doubt from Corinne. He also looks like both of them. Brendan’s eyes were from Corinne, Brendan’s manner of walking is from Al. Brendan also looks similar to his Chinese great-grandfather, who I have a photo of.

The Live Performance of Moonage Daydream is probably one of the most brilliant pieces by Bowie and Brendan and I never got tired of it. I can’t really listen to much of the music that Brendan always had cranked up on his sound system because it still hurts to listen to it even more than 3 years later. I miss him so much at times that everything in my body hurts. It’s so bitter-sweet. I love the memories but I hate the way it makes me feel. I realize that I may grieve for him throughout the rest of my life. Maybe not as intensely depending on how long I live.

Can I make a suggestion to those of you who are recently bereaved? Go into it as it takes you into the core of your heart. It will hurt like hell but go there. As you continually go there you eventually find that the person you loved and lost is there waiting for you. It’s pretty much the only way to grieve because if you don’t the grief will go somewhere else in your body or your life and it will mess you up or make you sick. You have no other choice when you are bereaved. I’m pretty sure I survived this grief by finding a grief therapist and early on joining a free grief group through Hospice. Also being able to grieve with family or friends who also loved Brendan. Of course, the amount of love you have for the person you’ve lost is the deciding factor in how you will grieve.

Favorite Music of Brendan Lai-Wing Leung

 

Video Tribute to Brendan Lai-Wing Leung 3 Years Later

I’m sharing this in the hopes that it might help someone.

The first few weeks after Brendan died I kept writing in my journal the sentence. “Where are you Brendan?” Where are you? Where did you go? You were just here and now you’re gone? Every night after work and before going to bed pages and pages of the same thing written over and over again. After a couple of weeks of this one evening, I was falling asleep to some soft, mellow music and I heard Brendan like he was just right there, not even far away, about 1 foot away and he said, “Wendy, if anybody knows this place, it’s you. You already know all about this place.”

It was then that I suddenly realized if I was going to continue to have Brendan in my life I was going to have to create a whole different relationship with him. He was no longer going to be the same as he was on earth in a physical body and all that comes with it. I can’t help thinking he was really happy about that. I don’t think he fit into the structure of Western Civilization very well. Money and Career didn’t matter at all to him. It was all about friends, family, and playfulness. And that can only get you so far in the material world. Especially in the Western World. So I was happy for him that he didn’t have to deal with those things anymore.

I decided I was going to trust myself and if I sensed he was nearby I was going to pay attention to it. I instinctively knew that I was the one who was going to have to change and trust my intuition and not rely on anyone to tell me how to sense spiritual things. Because you know how it is with these sorts of things. You have people who are atheists and my experience is just going to be a joke to them, or they think that I don’t understand Science, or maybe I’m hallucinating or wishful thinking. Then you have the religious people who are super invested in you only connecting to the spirit in a Christian way or a Hindu way or a Buddhist way. And if it doesn’t match their religion then they conclude that you’re naive or talking to the devil or something. So I knew if I was going to continue to keep in contact with Brendan that I had to change and start practicing listening to my soul. Nothing super profound has happened, so no one is going to be knocking on my door asking me for a movie deal. It’s not like I’m now a medium who channels spirits.

The only thing I learned (profound or not) is that our soul already knows that “other” place. And the other place is really super close. You can definitely sense it if you spend time alone and in quiet spaces. Meditation and pulling yourself away from the outside world really helps. Of course, that's difficult when you have to work 40 hours a week and raise children, etc etc. (This is when a pandemic and isolation has its advantages)

I had to stop framing the “other” side in terms of religious teachings. Also, Brendan stopped becoming someone ‘up in the sky’ or somewhere ‘else’. It took me 2 years to realize that he was a part of me now. I really started feeling him in my heart. Which sounds cliche and corny and I wish I could explain it better but I can’t. I resisted that feeling for so long, I didn’t want him to be a part of me, I wanted him to be Brendan and physically look how he always did on earth.

I remember at Brendan’s Scituate (South Shore) Memorial Gathering, Al Gibson came up and started talking to me about Brendan being a part of all of us now. I was selfish and didn’t want him to be a part of “all of us”. I just wanted him to be the same old Brendan in the same body, being the same person he was. After months and years of grief, Things have evolved for me. When I think of Brendan now it’s either right next to me or at one with me in my heart. When I say ‘at one with me’ I don’t mean only me, I realize that every one of us is connected and if we wanted we could experience it by focusing on our heart space. It takes practice though. So Al Gibson may be surprised that I still remember him saying that. (It really irritated me at the time because of the grief I was feeling but I understand what Al meant now)

I think there are a lot of people experiencing this with their loved ones who have passed on but they don’t tell anyone, they don’t share it because people have reactions to these sorts of things and end up shaming you for them or thinking you’re crazy and who wants that kind of judgment placed on such a sacred experience?

Sometimes I’ll be minding my own business, (usually late at night making some herbal tea before bed and suddenly I feel a really strong presence right next to me. I’ve learned what Brendan’s presence feels like to me so now I can identify it.)

I also don’t want people who loved Brendan wondering why they aren’t experiencing this kind of thing, but I think it’s simply because we expect the experience to be something startling, a big, grand vision and hearing perfect sentences spoken out loud. Seeing an apparition of our loved one in front of us with a message. But we have to remind ourselves that we are in this strange material world with 5 senses and that the spiritual world is much more subtle and works in a different way. So instead of expecting our loved one who has left earth to conform to our earthly expectations, maybe instead we need to become more spiritual and sensitive to the spiritual world which we are always a part of.

3 Years Since Brendan Died

This week will mark 3 years since Brendan died, yet it only feels like it was 6 months ago. Throughout 2018 I listened to a lot of Keening- Irish Lament Songs. If you've never heard of these songs I invite you to listen to a sample in the comments section. Warning: Keening songs are incredibly deep, heartfelt and primal and they still bring me to tears.

I’ve learned so much about grief and compassion since Brendan died. There is no such thing as time when it comes to grief. The pain is not as great this last year, but it is a frequent visitor. Our culture does not allow us time to grieve. That is the greatest tragedy. I've read, listened and watched so many things about death & grieving these past 3 years. I’ve been in grief groups, had a grief counselor, and joined online grief groups too. I’ve been comforted and now I have the privilege of comforting so many who have lost loved ones. I’ve seen an increase of people flocking to online grief support brought on by the death of so many during this pandemic. I thought I had learned all there was to know about losing loved ones and friends because I had lost a few of my loved ones before Brendan. And yet I was not prepared for his dead at all and I was shocked at how it affected me. How it knocked me off my feet and pinned me (so to speak). I so much wish our culture would teach us more about death, dying and grief so that we are somewhat prepared when it happens to us personally. Death is hidden in our culture. It's all done behind closed doors. Which makes it impossible to believe that it could ever happen to us.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ml3Q1a148Ko&ab_channel=%C3%81ineMinogue

 

Video of Derby Skateboard Bench featured on Braille Skateboarding Social Media

Brendan’s tribute skate bench created by Payson McNett was included in a Braille Skateboarding Episode.
About: Braille Skateboarding is a Skateboarding media company with over 5 Million followers across social platforms. The largest skateboarding YouTube channel in the world and their tutorials have taught millions how to skateboard. Braille was founded on the mission to push skateboarding all over the world and introduce new people to the joys of riding a board. They built this website as a resource for all. They have a full Skateboarding Trick Guide, a Skate Shop, and the best skateboarding tutorial and lesson plan ever made. Skateboarding Made Simple!

I Will Not Forget You

 

 

The Power of Public Mourning
Listeners of the ‘Death, Sex & Money’ podcast were invited to hold space for their 2020 losses. Here’s what happened.

 https://modernloss.com/the-power-of-public-mourning/?fbclid=IwAR3nLJjQisvvyHlHqJzGNOYf7nqoE3rKWsymEgmVMG9cOt5Sm763j6RgzH4

 

Leung 1946 Family Photo

 

4 skateboarding films offer fare beyond catching air

https://datebook.sfchronicle.com/movies-tv/4-skateboarding-films-offer-fare-beyond-catching-air

Every Part of Me Loved Every Atom of You

I found a small paper heart on Brendan's pillowcase this morning. I'm not sure how that happened but it was such a sweet and magical thing to wake up to.

The Kindness of a Black Male Nurse

Today on Juneteenth I decided to find only good news about white and black people together. It got me thinking about the kindness that one black nurse gave to me the night of Brendan’s accident.

I've never shared this story, but this morning I realized that it's Juneteenth and it would be an opportunity for me to tell you about my experience on one of the hardest nights of my life.

It was Feb 5, 2018. I was meant to meet Brendan at his house by 9:00 PM. He called telling me he was catching the bus for home--. I'm not sure if you remember reading the details from my FB posts a couple of years ago and how I found out about Brendan's accident.

When I reached B's house the place was dark and I thought that odd so I started calling Brendan's cell phone over and over again. He always, always picked up the phone no matter what. I knew something was wrong and I was feeling panicked. After 15 minutes of redialing I heard a man's voice at the other end of the phone but it wasn't Brendan’s.

I asked who he was and “why did he have Brendan’s phone?” and “where is Brendan?”. He told me that B had an accident. I don't remember the whole conversation because I was in so much shock. He just kept asking me how fast I could get there to the hospital. That's when I knew it was serious, that's when I knew B was going to die.

The man said, “I'm not supposed to answer a patient’s phone but you called over and over again.” I screamed into the phone at him, “how bad is it? Is Brendan going to live?" He was honest and said, "No, he won't live.......how fast can you get here?"

I'm fast-forwarding through the agony of the time before B's best friend picked me up and raced us over the hill where Brendan was airlifted. Those minutes and hours were some of the worst moments of my life.

We finally arrived at the hospital, I ran in yelling to the front desk to help me get to Brendan. A black male nurse walked forward, he said he was the nurse who talked to me on the phone. My head fell on his shoulder and I was crying out, "take me to him, please take me to him" I found out later that the nurse’s shift had been over but he waited an hour for me to get to the hospital anyway. He went with me to a little isolated room with a social worker who was there to take over. But I wouldn't let go of the black nurse's hand. I held tightly to his hand and pleaded with him not to leave yet, I didn't know how I was going to face the situation when Brendan's doctor came to talk to me. About 6 of B's friends arrived about 15 minutes later and met me in the room to speak with B’s doctor. I don't remember much more about what happened before the doc came in.

I don't remember when the nurse left, but I will always be grateful that this man, this black male nurse, picked up the phone after my frantic phone calls, waited for my arrival to the hospital (even though his shift was over) and let me hold his hand while I waited for the doctor that night. I never got his name, and I don't think I ever thanked him.