One of Kody’s favorite TV shows was How I Meet Your Mother. There is an episode after Marshall’s father dies in that show that is focused on the last words that he said to each of his son’s and Marshall being particularly embarrassed about the fact that the ones to him weren’t particularly meaningful. He eventually finds a voicemail on his phone from his dad that contains much nicer final words to him.
Suicide is sudden and sudden deaths seem to leave people feeling particularly incomplete. For me, the week when Kody died by suicide was a particularly busy one. I was in the middle of closing on my house and getting everything ready to move in the next weekend. For this reason, I didn’t have as much communication with him as I usually would have. I last talked to him the Sunday before, and he was gone on Wednesday when I tried to reach out to him again.
I would spend a lot of time thinking back on this conversation after my mother’s death just a few days over one month later. I consider my mother’s death to have been a completely perfect one. She died after being diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer. I’ll write more on it in another blog I’m sure. What’s important to this moment is that her last words were, “I love you all.” I can’t think of more perfect words than that.
On the other hand Kody’s last conversation with me wasn’t anything particularly compelling. We were having just one of those stupid conversations that friends have with one another. He had told me the night before that they made a Redwall game for the PS4 and he was considering getting it. We both loved the Redwall books. I told him that Netflix was going to be launching a Redwall series and he said, “Oooh. I hope it is done well.” Those were his last actual words to me.
Its a silly stupid conversation. Meaningless and quickly forgotten, if it wasn’t the last conversation I had with him. Its so interesting because even though its been almost six months since Kody died, it still feels like he just sent me those messages. Part of me still imagines that he’s just off on an adventure, soon to text me again. Its the part of me that I still can’t convince that he’s gone.
Just as in the episode of How I Met Your Mother, it was not until a little later that I learned that those were not actually the last words he would write for me. He wrote a part of his note to me specifically. The part I chose to keep in my heart as his last words to me reads, “You’re always gonna be my best friend, see you next go round if we meet.” He’s referring to our shared belief in reincarnation and that groups of souls spend their past and future lives in similar circles. It is beautiful and miserable but so him, so us, so perfect.