Mourning Maya

Death seems to have dominated the news lately. Seventy-seven killed in Nice, 5 police officers killed in Dallas, 3 black men killed by police officers, 49 killed in Orlando, 200 killed in Baghdad, 32 in Brussels and countless numbers killed in Syria. It is terrible, horrific. But those numbers are somehow impersonal, read on my phone or in the paper as I eat my oatmeal.

Then, last Friday, Maya died. Maya is the adult daughter of my backdoor neighbor, who has lived with her 80-something mom, Sara, for the last 8 years, since being diagnosed with a rare auto-immune disease that destroyed her lungs.

When I heard, I ran to the house. In the basement, in Maya’s apartment, Sara sat at a table, sobbing into her hands, her cane on the floor, our bishop’s arm around her. Maya’s little dog, Sunshine, trotted from one person to another, looking up, confused.

The police were in Maya’s room, trying to contact a doctor who would certify cause of death. All around us were evidences of Maya’s life: bags with un-opened craft materials, snacks for her and Sunshine, hospital bills, medicine bottles, stuffed animals, and lots of pictures.

Maya’s life began in India, where she spent the first two years in orphanages. Sara, a young California doctor, just completing her residency and married to man from India, had come to India to adopt a child. Her husband had specified he wanted one child, a son.

Sara spent weeks staying with friends and visiting orphanages. Then, in one day, she found her son, Raju, one-month old and still in the hospital where he had been abandoned. An hour later, she visited a school/orphanage and saw Maya, a bright little two-year-old, jumping up in excitement to answer the teacher’s question. Her husband had said only one, but Sara knew she had to have Maya.

Adopting the children took 6 months, during which both Raju and Sara nearly died, but eventually the children came home with Sara, who loved them unselfishly and completely. Sara’s husband eventually left the family.

I met Maya as an adult, when Sara moved into our Provo neighborhood 20 years ago. Maya, who never married, lived mostly in Phoenix, but it was always fun to see her on her visits. She was easy to talk to, easy to laugh with.

Eight years ago, Maya came home for Christmas. She had been feeling weak, but Dr. Sara knew immediately this was more than just fatigue or the flu. At the hospital, the nature of the disease was ascertained and Maya moved into her mother’s house. She was given four months to live.

So the eight years were a miracle. She was, at least with friends and neighbors, unfailingly cheerful. “Oh well,” she’d say. “It is what it is!”

Maya loved to get out and about. Medication managed the disease sufficiently that she could walk short distances and drive, carrying her portable oxygen tank in a back pack. She loved to go to the beauty college and get her hair and nails done, usually coloring one piece bright blue or pink. For the Fourth, each nail sported a different detailed patriotic design in red, white and blue.

Maya loved food. She loved shopping for it, cooking it, and eating it. She would drive to Harmon’s or Sprouts or the Indian store in Salt Lake, use the electric cart to cruise the aisles, and carefully select fresh, often exotic, ingredients. At home, she would need to text the neighbors for help getting the groceries in the house, but after resting, she could cook a meal, maybe something Indian and spicy and wonderful. Then, neither she nor her elderly mom would feel much like eating.

Sara, in her 80s, suffers from neuropathy and can barely walk, leaning heavily on a walker. Maya carries her oxygen everywhere and can barely breathe. They helped each other as they could, Maya lifting the walker out of the trunk for her mom, Sara carefully monitoring Maya’s treatment. We neighbors try to check on them, and always say, “Just call us if you need help!” They don’t, so every time we stop in, we ask about garbage to be taken out, or things to be lifted out of cupboards or unloaded from the car.

For the past few months, Maya’s lung capacity has plummeted. Her doctor has tried powerful last ditch medications—most recently chemo therapy to try to kill the immune system that was attacking her lungs. About a week ago, Maya told me the chemo wasn’t helping. Maya said, “Oh well. I guess that is that. I just feel sorry for my poor doctor. She has tried so hard.”

She continued, “I don’t mind dying. I know it isn’t the end. I know I will go on living. But what I hate is the waiting. What do you do while you wait? Twiddle your thumbs?”

As it turns out, she didn’t have long to wait. At the time of that conversation, we thought she would face months of dwindling health, that she would be in a hospital bed, gasping for breath.

But no. Instead she had her nails done. She walked out in the garden and checked on the growth of her potato plants. She went to the store. She made plans to have a fireworks party for the 24^th, and to take her niece and nephew to the movies when they came to visit. She said good night to her mom, talked about getting her hair done the next day, and went downstairs to her basement apartment. Her little dog Sunshine slept with her.

When Maya did not come upstairs in the morning, Sara knew something was very wrong. She took her cane and slowly, deliberately, made her way down the stairs to the basement, a journey she had not been able to make in years. She crossed the floor to Maya’s bedroom, where she found Maya’s lifeless body.

Sobbing, she called 911. The ambulance, the police, and the neighbors arrived. Sara cried. Sunshine looked confused and worried. The police tried to reach a doctor to sign a death certificate. The neighbors tried to comfort Sara, who alternated between sobbing and trying feebly to pick up some of the clutter that had accumulated in the apartment. At one point, frustrated that the police couldn’t reach a doctor, Sara picked up her phone, dialed the number and told the receptionist authoritatively, “This is Dr. Sara Trivedi and I need to speak with Dr. Marshall about an urgent matter.” Evidently doctors have more power than police, for, though Dr. Marshall was not in the office, a doctor was found who could sign the death certificate.

Eventually, the mortician came and Maya’s body was placed on the gurney. Sara hobbled over to tenderly stroke her face. “Goodbye, Maya.”

Death is very personal. I’m reminded again that all those numbers in the paper mean more, each one a beloved child of someone, each one with a story, each one with desires and favorites and fun and yearnings.

Of course, Maya’s self is not over. I know it continues elsewhere, where she can breathe and dance and do all she wants. And I know each of those who have died in all the attacks is also still living, in another form. Maya knew this. Sara knows this.

But Maya’s death, and all the other deaths in the paper, all the deaths are cause for mourning.