4 months later

The following was written to share at an All Saints’ Day service at the Table, 11/2/08.

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Before this year, I had never truly felt the sting of death.  I was always either too young to really be impacted, or had been provided time to prepare when death was imminent and natural and a relief.

That ended on July 3rd.  I was midway through the first of two weeks in Portugal, and eagerly looking forward to celebrating with my sister at her wedding in two days.  I stopped in at a local cafe to check my email–looking forward to hearing from friends and hopefully receiving some belated birthday congratulations.  Instead, I read an email subject line that will forever be ingrained in my memory: Death of Matt Garber.  What?  I didn’t comprehend it.  MY Matt Garber?  He can’t be dead, I’m going to have lunch with him in Auugst when he gets back from Costa Rica and I am passing through Pennsylvania–we’ve been looking forward to it for months.  I opened and read the message, and then opened and read all of the others I had received–each offering support and condolence and shared grief.  I still didn’t react–my body and mind were on autopilot.  I turned off the computer and made my way to the other side of the room, to my dad–and only then did I succumb to the most exhausting outpouring of grief I have ever experienced.

Four months have past, and the grief is still there.  But now that pain mingles with joy and my memories of Matt more often lead me to laughter than to tears.  I walk daily in spaces that hold rich memories of the many hours I spent with Matt.  From my desk at work I will often catch a glimpse of a red backpack over by the mailboxes, and I smile to myself thinking of how this used to signal an imminent visit from Matt, always with new stories guaranteed to send me into fits of giggling.   The recital hall in Lehman Auditorium is where I first learned to know Matt and where we spent the most time doing what we both love so much–singing.  Our shared musical experiences will always be some of my most vivid memories of my time with him.  But above all, memories of Matt surface most often when I find myself surrounded by the close-knit group of friends that we shared.  “Matt Stories” come up frequently in our conversation, sometimes sending us into quiet places of contemplation, but far more frequently sending us into howling bouts of laughter.  Even from his memorial service in July, laughter is what I most clearly remember.  Matt’s laugh, and his ability to make US laugh, remains one of his most precious gifts to us as we all make our way uncertainly into the future.  None of us knows how to do this.  We wrestle with anger and pain and jealousy and so, so many questions.  But we lean on each other.  We allow space for questions, and space to not have answers.  We give more hugs–holding each other close in a physical reminder that the time we have together is a gift, and not to be taken for granted.  We cry and we laugh and we find healing in our memories and in each other.

Ken Nafziger, a professor Matt thought so highly of, wrote the following tribute soon after learning of his death, eloquently describing the significant impact Matt had, and continues to have, on so many of our lives.  He wrote:

In spite of Matt’s tragic death this week, there are important things that death cannot take from me. The space that Matt occupied in my life cannot be occupied by anyone else. The memory of his laughter is mine forever. His love for music and for singing and for playing offers encouragement to engage others in making music. His love for God is written indelibly in my experience. His insatiable hunger and desire to add more richness, more experience, more knowledge, more soul, more friends is a model for any life well-lived. When I told him after graduation that he would really be missed in the year(s) ahead, I could not have known the real good-bye I was bidding him. I just know that in my memory and in my spirit, Matt lives on. Well done, good and faithful servant…

For his senior seminar class, Matt was required to write his “final words”, and after outlining his vision of a life well-lived, he concluded with this: The influence of his life is not finished with his death, just as he had hoped. The love he showed will live on in the hearts of the people he touched.

Though we all wish that these final words had not been called upon quite so soon, there is comfort in knowing that what he most wanted is being fulfilled.  Matt was a humble and willing servant, who succeeded in showing great love to the many people he touched, even in such a short time.  May that love live on in the hearts of all of us who were touched by him.

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~ by derstk on November 2, 2008.