I have never been to a funeral.  It’s a sentence that used to feel fortunate and glib, but after forty-six years, it feels immature and cowardly.  I haven’t consciously avoided death, but it has yet to really hit me close to the heart.  This includes the loss of my estranged mother, and yes, I know how callous that must appear.  So, as I round the putative mid-way point (were I to be so fortunate as to see nine decades), I am cognizant of the fact that, generationally speaking, Generation X has started to lose its parents en masse, and as that milestone is as formative as any for a generation, and I am excited for what our generation will do with the opportunity.

We grew up in a world almost completely foreign to our parents, and our relationships with them showed it. Parents went from masters curating a bespoke childhood experience within the family home, to Luddites, barely equipped to function in and operate their new homes and jobs, and hanging on for dear life in trying to keep up with their children who were being academically and technologically accelerated beyond their wildest imaginations before they even left home. But, despite their lack of qualifications, they endured as guiding forces in our lives. Their stoicism was a comforting and welcome respite from a world that wasn’t nearly as welcome on an individual level as it may have seemed for the collective (most of us were, “Freaks and Geeks” after all).

They still “got together” at their friends’ houses (families in tow) in the heady and pregnant hometown evenings of spring and fall and insisted on knowing their neighbors in a way that few of us recognize, today. Our parents came of age before the liberation of the 1960’s and the revolutions of the 1970’s, in a time when life was simple and small, and were forced to contend with a world that became globally connected so quickly that the wonder of it was almost immediately casual – with no time to consider what it all meant. More so than any generation that preceded them, they had to bridge wholly different realities, and raise their children without any relevant experience or guidance, and with the help of grandparents who had survived World Wars and/or the Great Depression, and consequently had little to offer on how to handle home computers and pop culture.

But like all mortal things, no matter how extraordinary, they must come to an inevitable end, and as they do, we begin to lose the bridge they provided and are forced to contend with the bridge that is demanded of our own generation.  While our parents’ past seemed colored in muted, even Sepia-like tones, our own past exists in far greater detail – not subject to the romanticism of anecdotal recital.  Our parents were the last generation to truly own their own stories, and we are forever indebted to them for the care and energy they put into telling those stories to us. The enormous courage and confidence it takes to write a life story is sometimes to hard to imagine, as the frailty of age robs our parents of their past bravado, but cannot be understated. What we know about what makes a “man” or a “woman” is almost entirely a function of these stories and how they repeat in our collective consciousness like a hit song on long gone 80’s pop radio. When I think of all the truly amazing people I know, I now think of what kind of parents it must have taken to create a person like that, and I am humbled in far greater measure.

Recently, a good friend lost her mother, and I was reminded, again, of this important debt. Were it not for this exceptional octogenarian, I simply would not have this person in my life. What’s more, she did far more than just launch her daughter’s life.  Like many parents, she endured and adapted her relationship with her daughter, letting it grow as they both did, serving as that same bridge between worlds, at a time when it’s never been more important to remember how we used to be.  But despite the overwhelming sadness that accompanied the news that her mother had finally succumbed to illness (after, as you might imagine, a protracted and brave fight), I felt like celebrating.

I am far from professionally trained in grief, loss or the psychology associated therewith, so this certainly isn’t clinical advice, nor should it be relied upon for that reason.  What’s more, I certainly don’t intend any disrespect in suggesting that the appropriate event to mark the passing of our parents is a celebration rather than a funeral, but while there is loss to contend with, there appears far more gain.  There are many ways to leave a legacy, but one of the most enduring is providing the world with excellent humans, who live, love, give, serve, laugh, cry, buy, sell, work, rest and so much more. In their wildest dreams, our parents could never have imagined the world that they populated, or the skills that would be required to master it. From their humble beginnings, they gave birth to every leader, hero, celebrity, influencer, and other amazing person that fills our world with wonder, today. No matter the immediate circumstances of their departure, it is difficult to imagine they wouldn’t be proud of the life they lived, and the gifts they’ve given us. Sooner or later, I’m going to lose someone close enough to me that attending a funeral will be inevitable, and it will likely be a parent of someone I care about. And while there will be plenty of tears and tissues, I’m hopeful that my own tears will be happy ones; that I’ll find occasion to smile, reflecting on what I gained from them and not what I lost when they finally left this world.  In the end, perhaps our own enduring generational contribution to this life will be a tradition of celebration of life and love to end a life well lived, from a generation who always turned to laughing – if only to keep from crying.