Michael

On September 19, my wonderful, loving, amazing brother died in an accident.  Our whole world has changed, our reality hard to process.  Michael is no longer in this world, he will not call or walk through the door.  He is no longer a part of all the beautiful things to come.  It hurts my heart so deeply that it makes it hard to breathe.  And as much as we don't want it to, life has continued to go on.  We are getting older, holidays have past, the sun keeps rising bringing a new day to help us heal, but the healing has been slow, at times non existent.  The grieving process is so unfair.  In the wake of losing someone you love, after you recover from the shock, the pain sets in.  Then you truly become aware of how fragile life really is.  How at any moment, this beautiful life can just stop.  Michael was not old, or sick, he was at the prime of his life doing amazing, productive things, and then one second later he was gone, his bright light extinguished.  It makes us contemplate our own mortality, a slap in the face reminder that all we really have is right now, this moment.  And with the perspective we gain after losing a loved one, we know all too well, that we should be kind and gentle with one another, love each other, laugh, be peaceful and forgiving, play with our children, love our partners in an open and unabashed way, spend time with the ones we love and make sure they are certain how much they mean to us because none of us know how much time we have left.  The unfair part about grief is that we have these moments of clarity where we know this and we are overcome with gratitude for all that is still here but then we are clouded by sadness, anger, confusion, and overwhelmed by  just how much we miss our buddy.  Fucking grief.  Its unfair that right at the time when we could be such examples of how to truly live life, just as Michael did, we have trouble rising above our sadness.  
My family is doing ok.  We are all trying our best to be gentle and kind, some days are better than others.  For me, my little Elwood is my inspiration.  Being a mother is the greatest role I have ever been given and even though I am sad, my little buddy needs me.  I cannot cry and collapse in a heap on the floor, not in front of my boy.  He, of course, has seen me cry and his little face comes close to mine and he cups my cheeks in his hands, looks me right in the eyes and says, "Don't be sad, Mom."  Then he squeezes me with his little arms and says "Hugs make you feel better."    It is not his responsibility to take care of me.  My tears and sadness confuse and upset him.  The strength I have found being a mother is nothing I have ever come close to experiencing prior to Elwood's arrival.  Since Michael's death, Woody and I continue to have fun; we go to the park, the beach, the zoo.  We color and wrestle and giggle and bake organic muffins.  We laugh and chase each other and lay in the grass just because it feels nice.  And it is done with such love and lightness in my heart.  These things I would not be doing by myself, that I am sure of.  But these things have been so healing for me.  I feel Michael at the beach, in the wind that blows the trees, in the moon we see on our walks in the evenings.  If I succumb to my grief I will miss all of these things.  I would like to think my strength in motherhood is all my own, but my little Elwood does take care of me, I draw my strength from his.  Two year olds know how to live life fully, in the now, and I am trying to follow his example.  

Conor had the enormous task of speaking at Michael's funeral.  He delivered a eulogy that Michael would have approved of.  It was full of laughter and truth and love.  I have included it below because I want to share it and I want it someplace easy for me to read again.    

I'm Conor.  I married Michael's sister Meghan. I am truly honored to have been asked to come up here and say a few words about Michael. I met Michael when he was 17, so the majority of you all have known Michael a lot longer than me. And I'm definitely not the best public speaker in Michael's huge, highly educated family.

  Maybe some of you thought I would be a bad eugooglizer........., you know, one who speaks at funerals. Oh what,....did you think I was too stupid to know what a eugoogley is?

In case you don't know, that's a reference from the movie "Zoolander", and although I didn't really do it justice, Michael would be so proud of me for working that into his actual eulogy.

To talk to Michael was very easy, very natural. To talk about Michael, I am finding, is more difficult. He was a gigantic person, a gigantic personality, so it’s hard to know where to start. Picture him in a room full of people at a party, and imagine you didn't know him. He was the first person you noticed, partially because he stood nearly a foot taller than most everyone else,.... even without his game-day mohawk, partially because he had a beard that looked like a sheep dog hanging onto his ears, and partially because when he smiled, and the sheep dog parted, he smiled so big that you wondered if he had more teeth than a normal human. Seeing him smile was magnetic, it drew you into him and brightened the room.  And of course his laugh. His laugh was so loud and bellowing, that it just got inside you and made you smile, and you couldn't stand it, you just had to walk over to him and listen in on the story he was telling.

Michael was so many things to so many people. He had this ability to be that person you needed right when you needed him, and he did that for all of us, and we all needed him to be something different, so we each had a unique and special relationship with him. We each connected with him over different things. He was a motivator, a promoter, and his interests became our interests.

Michael was an avid scuba diver; he got us excited to breathe underwater. I like the story about how when Michael was getting certified, his mask kept leaking, and he finally asked the instructor for help, and once they got back on the boat, the instructor told him it was because he was swimming around with this huge silly grin on his face, and his cheeks were pushing the mask up and breaking the seal.

        He had an insatiable need for music, and could play, with some degree of skill, almost any instrument you handed him. We all appreciated Michael's taste in music, even if it was a bit strange at times. I think he considered himself like an amateur music critic, and whenever the family got together Michael always had new music to pass around.

        He was a maniacal sports fan. The Jags, the Gators, Red Sox, Celtics, actually he had lots of favorites, and if you ever watched a game with Michael, his enthusiasm and excitement was so contagious that you would find yourself yelling at the game just like he was.

        He was the Commissioner for the Family's Fantasy Football League, and I hear he ran a pretty tight ship. Unlike the NFL, if conduct violations were made in Michael’s league, punishments came swift and severe. Punishments came swift and severe in any game you played with Michael, whether it is ball or board. It seemed like he had actually memorized all the rule books, and would not tolerate any bending of them.

      He was wildly creative in the kitchen, focusing his energies on opposite sides of the culinary spectrum: really good at pastries and desserts, really good with meat on the smoker.   If he had you over for dinner, he might have served a meal of just smoked meat and dessert.

This year he started work on his Ph D, at the Florida Institute of Technology in Melbourne. He credited Jack with his love for the ocean and his choice to be an engineer. A while back Jack explained to him how wave energy works, probably during a body-surfing session, and that conversation was enough to get the ball rolling, which eventually propelled him into the Lab at FIT. Michael found a second family in Dr Swain and his Lab mates at FIT. He really slid into his niche there. He was part of a team that designed underwater robots for cleaning ship hulls for the Navy. I understand his name is on a patent that may forever change the way the Navy maintains its ships. His research involved suction brushes. I've never seen someone get so excited talking about the battle of underwater brushes vs. algae and barnacles. Oh and he loved to tell us about barnacles.

  

Michael was a highly sensitive, highly feeling, highly tactile being. He had this static electricity surrounding him, just waiting to reach out and connect with a new experience. And so he had an appetite for energy and adrenaline, new experiences. My own deep connection with Michael came through the ocean. Friendly father/son competition in the ocean with Jack had made him into an above average bodysurfer. The last time I surfed with Michael was about a month ago.  I was on a longboard, and he was bodysurfing, just swim fins. I tried to convince him to bring a board out, but he wouldn't budge. He told me it’s one thing to stand on a board and ride on top of a rolling ball of energy, but something entirely different to be inside that ball of energy, to feel the energy itself, and he preferred to experience that in its rawest uninsulated form, nothing between him and the wave. I think I laughed at him or made noise like pfffft, but maybe he was getting something more out of those waves than I was getting.......cuz I remember his face out there.  That day it was a pretty good long period swell, probably 3 feet, and just super clean, and I was paddling back out,...and I saw Michael catch a wave.   I can still see him body-surfing with his long hairy torso sliding on the shoulder of the wave, and a beard full of green sea foam, just grinning from ear to ear.

The family and I were talking about the eulogy, and Michael's life, and Katie somehow found this Adam Sandler quote, which he must've said in an interview or something, but the quote is this: "I was raised by a mother who told me I was great every day of my life." That without a doubt pertains to Michael. Reenie, you told Michael he was great because he - was - great.

Meghan tells this story of how when Michael would come home from High School football practice, all sweaty and smelly and gross, Reenie would take his shoes off for him and rub his feet.  Meghan would just sit at the table doing homework or something, with this look of horror on her face, that someone would touch Michael's football feet. It was kind of funny  when everyone would come home to visit, we would all wake up and kind of be moving real slow, getting ourselves coffee, the house would still be quiet, but then Michael would wake up and all the sudden Jack is flipping pancakes, bacon is frying, Reenie is cracking eggs, and a fresh pot of coffee is brewing.

Michael left this world knowing he was deeply, deeply loved.

Furthermore, Michael left all of us here, knowing that we were deeply, deeply loved,...by him. I wonder if that is not a unique gift. We should all be so lucky to have shown our loved ones how much we really loved them, how important they are to us. Michael was called back very suddenly, without warning. He didn't have some foreshadowing, or some sign that his death was near,...no time to "get his affairs in order" But he didn't need to. His affairs were already in order. He kept his affairs in order by simply walking this earth with his heart on his sleeve. He took advantage of every chance he had to show his love, to spend time with us, to come for a visit, to send a gift, to call and say hello.

So what do we do now, now that we are down here and he is up there? What would Michael want us to do? I think he would want us to live like he did, with our hearts on our sleeves. He would say take it easy, slow down, sniff a rose or two. He would say: call each other, visit each other, love each other. Tell each other how much we are loved. Rub each other's feet, even if they are stinky and gross. (You hear that honey? Michael would want you to rub my feet). He would say Go to every wedding,...and make sure you dance. go to every birthday party, and sing. Don’t waste a single second on anger or regret. Live each day like it’s the best day of your life.

We are all going to remember Michael in our own unique ways, and it will likely reflect our own unique relationships with Michael. For me, I am going to start by saying yes... to everything. Michael said yes to everything. I never heard Michael say no to anyone in his life.

-When Chris Prevatt says do you want to drive through the night to see a PHISH show, not go to bed and turn around and drive back the next day just in time for work? I will say yes, cuz Michael would say yes.

-When Katie says do you want to help me make miniature fairy houses, and fairy furniture out of twigs for the Annie and Maren's birthdays?

I will say yes of course, because Michael loved making those Fairy Houses, Katie.

- When Jack says to you want to climb up in the attic and pull all Reenie's boxes of Christmas decorations down,

I will grumble, and then say yes, which is exactly what Michael would've done.

- If anyone in Michael’s lab needs a surf partner, they can call me and I will come, this time without my board.

- If Patrick needs someone to paddle him around in a canoe, in a zig zag pattern, just for fun, I will be his man.

- If Danny Travers says he is starting a new band and can I be in it,

I will say what instrument do you want me to play? COWBELL - yes, done.

- If Mark asks me to go skydiving with him,

I will say.....no, cuz I’ve already done that once and once was enough, but I will go and watch.

- If Sara says do you want to dive with Great Whites in South Africa

I will say yes, cuz Michael would say yes.

- When Pat and Jerren ask if I want to go with them and Ama, my littlest niece, to her first gator game I will go, and I will help put her hair up into an orange and blue mohawk, cuz that’s what Michael would do.

- And in the Fall, I will go to Rockport, to see the leaves change, and eat lobster with the Yasaitis's, and swim in the icy ocean with John. And my family will walk by the Harper family's first house, And I’ll point to it and say to my kids, that's where your uncle Mike grew up.

And tonight, before I go to sleep I will kiss my wife, and hug her, and tell her how important she is to me. And at 5 in the morning when Elwood wakes me up, (because that’s what he does) I'm not going to tell him to go back to sleep, I'll pull him into bed with us, and cuddle him, and ask him what he dreamed about.

And the next day I will do it again, and the next day again and again

And all of us here, will do all these things for each other, and with each other,...so that when our time comes and we are called back, and we see Michael again, we will be able to say "See Michael, we did it man, we lived, we really lived man. And you helped us. You made us better at living life"

It is with deep sadness and swollen hearts, that we say goodbye to a friend, a brother, a son, a cousin, an uncle, a nephew, a truly remarkable human being.

Rest easy Michael Harper. I know your grandparents and Steven and you are all holding hands right now.

Until we meet again, we will look for your smiling beard in the whitewater of the waves.