Happy deathday? We need a word to mark the commemoration of loss
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Anniversary feels wrong. The word, I mean. Too much like a birthday, a jolly marking on the calendar, a party. But English doesn’t offer much else. Not that I can find. And lately I’ve been looking, as May 24 approaches.
That’s the day, the early morning, that Dad died 10 years ago, an old sea-dog sinking below the surface in palliative care. I remember the phone breaking my hotel sleep. Then the subsequent blur, standing in Pyrmont light, giving a crossword class at the Sydney Writers’ Festival. A capable zombie in action.
So that was then, the stupor of the day a faint scar in the memory. Only for May to return, the date coming full circle, again proving English bereft. What do we say? The dictionary’s empty. James Gandolfini, the actor to play Tony Soprano, died a month after my own sudden news, so how would we label an HBO tribute to the vacuum he’s left? A deathiversary? A timely tribute?
A sober celebration: English fails us when it comes to marking a loved one’s “deathiversary”. Credit: iStock
Chatrooms like Quora and Reddit have tried their best. Bogus blends like “annihearsary” and “creminiscence” lend cold comfort. Catholic liturgy mentions “a year’s mind”, a requiem for a parishioner a year, or several years, from their death. “Mind” in this context draws on the Scots idea of remembrance, preserved in the adage, “out of sight, out of mind.” Though here, amid the votive candles, every effort is made to reverse that proverb.
Yiddish has “yahrzeit”, literally year-time, not to be confused with the game where players dice with death for points. Indeed, “deathday” is another tack, popularised by JK Rowling in the deathday party thrown for Nearly Headless Nick, a Gryffindor ghost. Inspired by that mention, perhaps, a post-punk outfit called Deathday Party (later just Deathday) performed their ominous 2008 debut at an LA club named The Smell.
Then there’s “barasee”, a Hindi term for death anniversary. At least the notion has been distilled into a word, reinforced by “shraadh”, that faith’s annual rite to pay one’s respects to the deceased. Such observances echo Japan’s ancestor worship, or Tagalog’s “babang luksa”, literally the lowering of mourning. One year hence from her husband’s death, the widow has leave to remarry, a memorial as much as an emancipation.
A globe-trotting way of saying English has nothing. Our vocab is likewise wanting when it comes to identifying another momentous date on many lifelines. At some point most of us will dodge a bullet, be that a medical crisis, a road trauma or however the reaper arrives, only for the scythe to miss. One year later, what do you call that day? A surviversary? A rebirthday?
Again, a dictionary hunt is futile. Sharing the quandary on social media, I received a flood of suggestions, from “me-more-ial day” (kudos to LR of Tuesday’s crossword) to “mirthday”, from “swerveday” to “thanksliving”, from “rechance” to Graham Kidd’s “TFIA Day” (where F is the curse you imagine). Often a survivor’s near-nemesis will form part of the neologism, such as “strokeversary”, or the clunkier “transplantiversary”. Each person to their own miracle, I suppose, with little in the lexicon to help.
For someone like Heather Gridley, who flew through a windscreen 50 years ago, she happened to know the day as “tomorrow”. Or she did back in February, when I happened to ask the question a day before her historical prang. Meanwhile, for the Astles, living in the spectre of May 24, a decade since Dad lost his last scrape with death, we’ll devote our own thoughts and share our own memories, despite Mother English not coming to the party.
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