Susan's Sunset: SF General, 5pm, Nov. 18, 2006
4. My teacher says, "paradise is not a destination."
Still, I can't help but think of my heart as a landscape
and home as a place.
Have you a map, a compass, an arrow?
He is there, I imagine,
worth this long road,
worth a map, a compass,
a hundred finely hand-whittled instruments.
posted by CUZED at 1:00 PM
2 Comments:
A myspace posting I put up a few weeks ago, that seemed appropriate to add here. I miss you Suze..
Monday, November 20, 2006
Susan Birkeland 1961-2006
Current mood: sad
My cousin Suzie passed away last Saturday, finally. That's a strange thing to say I suppose, but it's true. Cancer ate away at her from a million directions-well at her body anyway- her soul on the other hand, was as wired and saucy as ever. My eyes get wet remembering this.
Suzie was more like a big sister than a cousin. She was in her mid fourties when she passed, but I always felt her age was so misleading. She embodied the perpetual youth and boldness of someone just turning 18, not someone moving toward retirement.
I remember once at my brother's wedding, she insisted that I wear this purple stone necklace. I cringed because my dress was green, and I dreaded the comments about my fashion sense when the pictures came out, but Suzie insisted it was more important that I HAD something beautiful, rather that thinking I WAS beautiful because of it. Smart woman.
Suzie was a painter, and a poet. She was ever comfortable in her body, and in her crazy curly locks of hair. She was a "second mother" to every kid within 100 yards. She used to welcome you with a "hey girl" or "hey lovely" in her crazy bohemian mix of texan drawl and california aura.
Suze never married or had kids, and sometimes I pitied her for it. I feel shameful admitting that now, but sometimes I thought her life really was so much "less" than others, as though because she was single, she was somehow punished. But last week, when I sat in the hospital family room, waiting for my turn with my favorite cuz, I watched person after person trail out of her room, and I realized she was the poster child for "not alone."
I heard through the grapevine, that her biggest hurt in life was how unaccepted and misunderstood she felt by her family for her way of life. She felt judged for her career choices, for being single, for living simply, and for being different. She said her saving grace was the community and life she found in San Fransisco.
I'd love to say that it was other family members she referred too, but on a number of occasions, I know I judged her, and looked down on her choices, and now I feel so hallow because of it.
Now instead of worrying that I will end up like Suzie, I'm begging God that I do. I want to lie on my death bed painting pictures of sunsets, and joking about my "sherbert" socks. I want to see something I wrote published and in print, even as I lay with days left. I want to have my sister curled up beside me stroking my hair and talking about all the wacky things we did when we were 8. I want to have friends, community, and support in a thousand different forms rallying around me. I want to follow her example. I want to leave a legacy like she has.
They say artists are never appreciated in their lifetime, now I know that's true. I told Suzie for years that I would come to visit her in San Fran, that I would come hear her read her poems at her friends Theater or that I would hang out with her in her small efficiency $400 a month apartment with the murphy pop out bed and we'd talk till dawn. Instead I'll find myself in San Fran twice this month, first to hold her one last time, and the second to say goodbye.
To my suze, a small little ridiculous myspace tribute: You inspire me, You amaze me, You humble me. Let your legacy be this, you'll never be forgotten by this crazy little cousin you loved from 1,000 miles away... and here's some of my favorites of yours that I'll hold onto...
(chant from Suze and Deb when they were kids)
(insert name here) is a NUT
with a rubber BUTT
everytime she turns around she goes PUTT PUTT (repeat incessantly, using tickling if necessary)
"The Joy of the Yet Unmarried" by Susan Birkeland
Down at the water
the seagull eats bread and strudel
without comment.
Picking glass out of dancing feet
how sad this life
how sweet.
"On being from Hibbing" ( a poem published just a few weeks ago in a San Fransisco Literary Journal in which Suze told about her hometown of Hibbing, MN from the viewpoint of one of her icons-Bob Dylan)
More of Suze's poetry in " The Bruised Angel's Almanac" 2006 Zeitgeist Press at
http://www.zeitgeist-press.com/
Paintings and more to come... (when Sonja's computer skills catch up with her typing abilities:)
Currently listening :
The Times They Are A-Changin'
By Bob Dylan
Release date: By 21 June, 2005
9:16 PM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment - Edit - Remove
Deb Birkeland Lindsey said....
Friday, December 8th
Sonja, your heartfelt admiration of Susie brought tears to my eyes. She inspires me daily, I feel that she is now, though gone from physical life, alive on the spiritual plane, and vigorously completing her guardian angel training, while she checks in on us all, and plans her next angelic poetry reading. God has vast canvasses for her to paint upon, and she is still shining her light, through not only memory, inspiration, but as an angel of God, for those of us who are still on the pilgrimage which she completed so majestically. Love, Sister Deb.
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