CENTRE COUNTY — I’m sitting in the front passenger seat of our SUV writing this on my laptop as my husband is driving us to our son’s MBA graduation ceremony in Frostburg, Maryland. I’m feeling lots of pride and awe at what our son has accomplished in his five-and-a-half years as a student athlete, beginning with one semester at Wagner College, moving to the University at Buffalo where he earned his bachelor’s degree in communications, and then onto Frostburg State University for his graduate degree. I’m certain this rite of passage ceremony will touch my heart — I just have to hear the beginning notes of “Pomp and Circumstance,” and my eyes fill with tears.
At our son’s graduation ceremony in Buffalo, I was struck by the way people in the United States still embrace the graduation rite of passage. We get dressed up and happily sit through what can sometimes be long — and somewhat tedious ceremonies. For good reasons though, graduations are significant. They honor leaving one stage of life and entering into another.
The same is still true of many weddings. Even though fewer people are getting married in our country, wedding ceremonies involve all kinds of ways to help couples leave single life and enter married life, including extravagant proposals, elaborate bachelor and bachelorette celebrations and well-choreographed nuptials. Here again, this rite of passage is significant and honors the transition from one stage of life to another.
The same is not true, however, of funerals. The number of people coming together to honor the deceased’s transition from life to whatever you believe happens next, and the living’s transition from one role to another has decreased. Why do we as a people choose to continue honoring some rites of passage but not others?
I wonder if it is about the emotions involved. All rites of passages involve change. All change involves loss, even positive changes. Grief is the natural reaction to loss. But the loss with some changes feels heavy. This is especially true of loss due to death and its challenging emotions of grief.
As I companion others around dying, death and grief, I see again and again that the emotions of grief are challenging. Even so, I also see that allowing ourselves to spend time in the obscure darkness of grief transforms us and moves us forward. Even though these grievers would rather have their loved ones back, they often find pieces of their transformations for which they are grateful. At minimum, they feel more compassion. We talk about grief and gratitude, sorrow and sweetness, wounds and wisdom, and darkness and light — two sides of the same coins.
In grief education and support groups I facilitate, I hear those further out from their losses encouraging others still feeling the intense raw emotions of grief. The seasoned grievers say that although they never forgot their loved ones, the way they carried their grief and how it held them changed through time. These encouraging people participated in various rites of passages when their loved ones died and continue to journey through their grief in community by taking part in the support gatherings.
It takes time to accept the reality of the changes that rites of passages guide us through. Once our son walks across the stage and receives his master’s degree, he’ll know in his head that he has graduated, but it will take time to integrate all of the changes that will accompany that.
After the death of a loved one, it takes time to accept that reality and everything it means. If we felt all of those changes at the time of the death, it would be even more overwhelming. Rites of passage start us on that process. We start to recognize our new roles, for example, as widows or widowers. Grief education and support gatherings help us along by showing us that we are not alone on our journeys. All of this aids us in our transformation through grief.
This New Year’s Eve, Koch Funeral Home is offering two ways to help us all accept the reality of the deaths of those we’ve loved, while also honoring them. First, we’ll have a Remembrance Tree available at First Night in the lobby of the State College Municipal Building from noon to 10:00 p.m. on Tuesday, Dec. 31. There will be ornaments available to decorate in remembrance of your loved ones and hang on the tree. And second, from sunset on Tuesday, Dec. 31, until sunrise on Wednesday, Jan. 1, Koch will have a luminaria display at the Funeral Home at 2401 S. Atherton St. Each luminaria will represent a family served in 2024.
I will be decorating an ornament and viewing the luminarias in remembrance of my dad who died earlier this year. If our new graduate is in town, I’m sure he will be joining me. I hope you will participate to remember your loved ones too.
And if you want to be a part of our grief education and support gatherings that can continue to serve as ways to help you continue to heal as you accept the reality of your loved ones’ deaths, you are invited to the following:
• Virtual Monday’s Moments Gatherings, “Having Hope” on Monday, Jan. 6, from noon to 1:30 p.m. on Zoom.
• Med-Knit-ations: Knitting Our Hearts Back Together in partnership with Centre Region Parks & Recreation on Tuesday, Jan. 14, from noon to 1:30 p.m. at Schlow Library, 211 S. Allen St., State College.
• Stories of Loss in Partnership with Juniper at Brookline on Tuesday, Jan. 14, and Tuesday, Jan. 28, from 4:30 to 6:00 p.m. at Juniper at Brookline, 1950 Cliffside Drive, State College.
• Death Café Virtual Gathering on Monday, Jan. 20, from 4:30 to 5:30 p.m. on Zoom.
• Monday’s Moments at Millbrook Marsh in Partnership with Centre Region Parks & Recreation on Monday, Jan. 27, from noon to 1:30 p.m. at Millbrook Marsh Nature Center, Donald Hamer Community Room, 548 Puddintown Road, State College.
More information can be found on the Bereavement Gatherings and Events page under Resources on the Koch Funeral Home website. To reserve your spot and receive the invitation links, email Jackie@JackieHook.com, call 814-237-2712, or visit the Koch Funeral Home Facebook page.
Jackie Naginey Hook, MA, is a spiritual director, celebrant and end-of-life doula. She coordinates the Helping Grieving Hearts Heal program through Koch Funeral Home in State College. For more information, please call 814-237-2712 or visit kochfuneralhome.com.
