"“No Words Needed in Love & Dying”"
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Two month's after my nephew's death, I returned to London to support my Buddhist teacher’s student, Ela, who was dying from breast cancer.
Ela gave me the little Tara statue you can see next to my bed.
I spent a week by her bedside offering moral and spiritual support. Her father from Poland was also visiting and couldn’t speak English. When Ela was asleep or resting and unable to translate we had to find a way to communicate so we could all co-exist in this sacred space. We figured it out using books and gestures. It turned out he was the gardener at a Palace in Warsaw connected to a Princess who had visited the stately home I grew up seeing across the fields in my childhood home in England. Despite our cultural and language differences, we found a way to connect, and however horrid Ela’s last months were, there was much joy and laughter (and good food) shared in her home.
After Ela died in a hospice in London, she returned to Poland to be buried with her family near their plum orchards. Her father sent me a photo and a copy of her memorial information.
Ela died age 49, the same age I was when I nearly died. I reflected a lot on Ela on my own sick bed and what she must have experienced at that same age knowing she was soon to leave us. I think she was braver than me.