Time Adventure

Shortly after starting to watch Adventure Time, I used it to cope. I was dealing with loss and trauma, and with nearly every moment spent waiting for the tears to come, I stopped them with this ridiculous kid and his dog.

My grandfather died of bladder cancer that had spread to his brain. My mother, sister, aunt, grandmother, and I spent his last few days taking care of him while he screamed and cursed and wandered between life and death. When we got the call that he was out of hospice to die at home, we drove two hours to be with him and grant him his dying wish: to have his girls with him as he passed.

When we got there it felt like his soul was hovering over his body and he asked me, "Are you okay with me going where I'm going?"

Three days later—three days of him getting an energy rush from morphine and stomping around with his 6'4 frame and Prednisone-bloated body, nearly mowing us all down, as he yelled about a race he was supposed to go to and how we were all imbeciles— he died with a fight. He was turning blue and his organs were shutting down and he had the cursed 'death rattle' from his lungs weakening. This went on for two hours and we sang a very diverse array of songs from Panic! At The Disco, to The Beatles, to Prince, to Dreamgirls to the one upsettingly appropriate Keane song we knew—"Somewhere Only We Know." He always loved to hear my sister and I sing so we figured we'd sing him to sleep.

For the next few days I was fine. I didn't cry at the funeral and I went to school. In the next few weeks however, the weight of situation fell on my head like a bowling-ball because the only thing that kept it up was shock, now I had to accept the situation. I was a mess. The way my autistic brain found reason was in patterns—I looked for the patterns on my clothes, on floor tiles, on my couch, everywhere—but that was it. I had never experienced grief like this and when my brain gave up on searching for stability and predictability, I broke down. This would happen multiple times a day for about two weeks. I would be fine for an hour or so and then I would either get exhausted for no clear reason, or I would start crying because I remembered something, or because the sheer terror of death consumed me. I loved my grandfather, probably not as much as he loved me, but I loved him. And I watched him descend into chaos and then stop forever. Nothing made sense. So I watched a show that didn't make sense.

Adventure Time is bonkers. At the beginning it's just this kid and his magical stretchy dog fighting mythical monsters in this ineffable world. I loved it because it was so insane that you could laugh at any point and it would be appropriate and that little bit of certainty in uncertainty was comforting. So whenever I couldn't stop crying or wanted to stop myself from crying altogether, I would turn Adventure Time on and distract myself from my PTSD.

I eventually went back to school and made things up and tried to get back to how things were, but things were unstable anyway. About a week before Grandpa died I found out about one of my parents' affairs that had been going on for a year with someone I had known my entire life and about a month before Grandpa died, I got diagnosed with Autism.

I had to do a lot stabilizing and searching for answers and I watched each character do the same. Finn kept trying to find his origin and trying to have relationships; Jake became a father and had to figure out how that played into his carefree and laidback identity; Marceline outlived everyone she loved and tried to become her own form of human; Bubblegum tried to balance her personal life with keeping her kingdom in order while everyone in it needed her to be their protector; Ice King loses his identity entirely and battles his loneliness with unhealthy tendencies; Flame Princess literally burned everything she touched while trying to love and be loved.

And in the end, BMO, the sweetest, simplest character was the one who brought light and peace to the land of Ooo. BMO sang this beautiful song to comfort Jake as the world crumbled around them. Everyone sang and that became the antidote for the destruction. "Will happen, happening, happened. And we'll happen again and again 'cause you and I will always be back then."

In the end there was loss and sadness and confusion, but this beautifully sweet song created room for acceptance. I went through so much and I hurt so much, but with loss and trauma I had to adapt. I had to grow (weird to think that a children's show helped me with that, but still). I lost someone I loved in the most direct and heartbreaking way but I have the simplicity in my heart to know that that's a part of the process. People will go in and out of my life and I'll do the same for others but even though it ends, it wasn't all bad. I can find comfort in my thoughts of him and recognize the significance of his death. "It seems unforgiving when a good thing ends, but you and I will always be back then." I guess I mourn the part of me that died with him, as well. I can only move forward with my trauma and my grief because I can't leave them behind. I know that I'm not actively going through it anymore, but when the intrusive memories pull me down I have to remind myself that they're back then.

Life is good and bad and death is no different. He's dead, he's gone, but he's not in pain, and maybe he's in a better place or he's living another life or he just gets to rest. I have my terrible memories of him that seem to show up the most, but I also have him as a comforting memory. He was a good person and he taught me things and we loved each other.

Things will end, people will end, but it's better to understand the significance of pain and hope it can get better now than to dwell on the pain itself and shun the memory altogether.

Adventure Time ended on September 6th of 2018 and my Grandpa died on September 9th of 2018. It was there exactly when I needed it, and I hope to keep growing with the things it taught me. I hope somehow, in space and time, when glob tallies my deets, I get to sing Time Adventure to him. I'm sure he'd like to hear it.