Your Seasons

ARTIST STATEMENT

As we grow older, we gain a deeper understanding of life. Like a camera finally gaining focus, many concepts that once felt so abstract and intangible gradually become clear. I’ve never had much experience with loss. I knew of it but never really understood it until this past year.

Losing my grandfather to the big C felt like I was grieving someone who was still alive. Chemotherapy and radiation reduced him to a husk, and it was painful to move forward with the looming threat of his inevitable end. I was torn between cherishing the time I had left with him and mourning the grandpa in my memories. When he passed, it felt so wrong to feel emotional about it. Subconsciously, I convinced myself that his death was a logical progression of events: a man lost his battle with cancer and died. We all saw this coming, so there’s no point in being sad or upset about our loss. We were ready for this, right? I thought I was.

It was only months after his funeral when the realization hit me. I was cutting my brother’s hair (a routine we picked up during the quarantine), and I remembered the last time I cut my grandpa’s hair. It was days before he was admitted to hospice care. He was so fragile, slumped on our kitchen chair as I tried my best to work the clippers around the swelling of his jaw and neck. His graying hair fell to the tiled floors like petals off a withering flower. My grandpa had always been a man of appearances: he was consistently dressed well, maintained a well-groomed appearance, and exuded confidence wherever he went. Remembering him so far removed from his usual sophisticated look shattered me. The grief I thought I had escaped caught up to me, and I was not ready. No amount of mental preparation would ever have prepared me for this.

I realized that he wasn’t just a ‘man’ who lost his battle to cancer. He was a caring husband, an enduring father, a gentle grandfather, a reliable brother, and a wise friend. He was more than what my rational mind summed him up to be. Thousands of cancer patients die every day, and even more die yearly. He was just a statistic in the grand scheme of things. In an attempt to protect myself from anticipatory grief, I had reduced him to a nobody. But he was somebody to me. It wasn’t right to remember him as a victim of cancer. I needed to remember him as the dapper war veteran who was unmatched in poker and doted on the young. He was my grandpa and so much more. I learned to be more appreciative of my time on Earth, of those around me, and of my health. My first lesson in loss is that it gives more than it takes.

Process

I designed and developed this web documentary using Visual Studio Code and pulled pictures from family archives. In doing so, I had a few difficult discussions with family about our experiences with losing my grandpa. It was very rewarding growing closer to family despite losing someone so close and dear to us. Personally, losing my grandpa felt so fast, I didn’t even have time to process the events until years later, which is okay because we all mourn in our own ways. I hope my web documentary offers some solace to those who have experienced something similar to this, as this project is something personal, vulnerable, and deeply emotional for me.