The past year has seen the death of quite a number of public figures. Michael Jackson's was the most prominent, but there have been others. However Jackson's was the death that prompted the worst excess of public grief. It seemed perfectly acceptable for people who had never met him to collapse into paroxysms of grief in public. Television cameras all over the world recorded scenes of people with tears pouring down their faces laying flowers at the impromptu shrines they had created for this person whom they had never met. Nobody questioned their behaviour or wondered why they would have such a violent reaction to the death of someone who in recent years was better known for his suspicious activities than for any artistic creations.

Earlier this year my wife's uncle passed away, leaving behind his wife and two adopted children. They had been married for more then 30 years and in that time had grown inseparable - one never thought of one without mentioning the other. So it was perfectly understandable that she was devastated when he died. Yet at his funeral there were whispers of why doesn't she control herself, who does she think she's trying to impress in response to her grief. However, the real whispering didn't start until a couple months after his death and she was still liable to burst into tears at any time.

My wife and I were at a family dinner some months after her uncle died and the subject of her aunt came up. We hadn't been in contact with her since the funeral so we asked how she was doing. I was shocked by the vehemence of the disgust that was expressed over the fact that she was still crying over the loss of her husband. "She gets one glass of wine into her and she's off" was said with great scorn.

I couldn't believe it; the woman had lost the person who had been the biggest part of her world for close to 30 years and people were being impatient with her because she was still grieving. I couldn't help thinking how I'd be reacting if my wife was the one who had died and. How could they expect her to be able turn off the grief she was feeling as if it were something she had any control over? I would have been more concerned if she hadn't still been crying over her loss. Yet here was this group of so-called adults, supposedly her family and support, sitting around nodding wisely and saying it was time for her to get on with her life.

Article Author: Richard Marcus

Richard Marcus is the author of the recently published What Will Happen In Eragon IV? and has had his work published in print and online all over the world. The not so long-haired Canadian iconoclast writes reviews and opines on the world as he sees …

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