HANNAH COMERFORD
Netflix Suggestions for Grieving
Diagnosis Murder
When your step-dad Larry died of a heart attack, you and your mom left the hospital together in silence. You returned to the small mobile home you’d all shared with his mother.
Your step-grandmother never liked you, reprimanding you for minor offenses such as opening the curtains during the day (“The sun will fade the furniture”). Now, however, you had no living connection to her, and you could feel the lukewarm welcome chilling to stone. You and your mother would need to find a new home.
But that night your mom could barely think about funeral arrangements, let alone living arrangements. That night you needed some semblance of normality. So together you watched Diagnosis Murder on the box television set, just like you would have any other weeknight with Larry.
An hour later the murder was solved, Dick van Dyke’s character was happy, and you and your mom had survived a little longer.
Elizabethtown
You were seventeen, visiting your best friend Alissa, the day you learned your mom had died in her sleep.
When you couldn’t cry anymore, you and Alissa visited the local movie rental store.
You roamed the lonely rows of new releases and classics, comedies and horror. You grabbed a cover with Orlando Bloom—because it was Orlando Bloom.
“How about Elizabethtown?” you asked.
“Are you sure?” said Alissa, raising an eyebrow.
You told her yes, but she grabbed a backup as well.
An hour later, you both sat on her bed in her attic room, cuddled together like children during a thunderstorm. As Alissa hit play, you remembered the movie’s plot revolved around a memorial service for a parent.
Anchorman
You remember little from any Will Ferrell movie; they all blur together in your memory. Anchorman, though, was doomed from the moment you said, “Let’s watch this instead.”
From then on, any mention of news anchor Ron Burgandy would remind you of that day.
You’d think about your aunt calling your cell phone as you tried on jeans at JCPenney. How you yelled at her to tell you where your mom was. How you fell backward in shock and dislocated your shoulder. How you and Alissa held each other to cry on the floor of the dressing room. How you stumbled back to her blue Corsica like a drunk. How you climbed the stairs to Alissa’s room and envisioned hurling your body from the window. How you stayed up late hoping a ridiculous movie of inuendoes and outlandish fights and mocked sexism would comfort you to sleep.
You will never watch this movie again.
The Matrix
Complicated plots distract from complicated family dynamics and choices no teenager should make. You watched this movie with your best friends late at night when you wanted to forget the day.
That afternoon, three uncles, one aunt, and your grandmother met with your church’s pastors in the church basement, the same room where your mom had sat and discussed the Bible with other middle-aged men and women every Sunday morning.
Your relatives and pastors discussed funeral plans, the conversations springing around the room without you—until they mentioned cremation.
Your no was the surest thing you said all week.
“She didn’t want to be cremated.”
“I talked to her the night before . . .” said Uncle Randy, hesitating. “We talked about how it didn’t matter what happened to our bodies. They’re just that—bodies. Her soul is in heaven.”
“No,” you repeated. “She didn’t want to be cremated.”
You should have told Uncle Randy that he had not been with your mom seven years earlier, when she had opened an erroneous letter from the funeral home saying they’d cremated your stepdad. Uncle Randy did not see her crying, did not hear you ask why, did not hear her say, “Because we don’t believe in cremation.”
But no was all you could say.
You were seventeen—you did not understand what happened to deceased bodies or the price difference between burial and burning. But you needed to find some choice you could be sure she would make.
The memorial service was set for the next week, on a weekday, the only available day for the church. No open casket, but no urn.
“We have jobs to get back to,” said Uncle Dan, speaking for the Minnesotan relatives. “We can’t take more time off. And, well, we know where Barbara is. I think we can all agree that this isn’t the important part. It’s about knowing she’s in heaven.”
You should have said, “That’s not the only important part. Uncle Mike, Uncle Dan, your only sister is dead. Grandma, your only daughter is gone. But her only daughter is still alive, and you can miss one extra day of work to help her grieve.”
But you did not say that. It would be months before you would find anger for your relatives, years before you would start to comprehend what their adult grief might have felt like.
Until then, your rebellion would be watching an R-rated movie with physics-defying fight scenes—something you would not have done three weeks earlier. You didn’t realize you could watch whatever you wanted now. You didn’t see that you could make your own choices.
Friends
When you went to your first OB appointment, you had finally convinced yourself you weren’t crazy, you really were pregnant, you would see your child for the first time that day.
Then the OB pushed the wand into your body and gently prodded, searching for silent minutes. Your husband gripped your hand as he looked at the screen.
“The good news is, there is a pregnancy in the uterus,” said the doctor.
You looked at the fuzzy screen and saw a blob.
“Unfortunately, the pregnancy looks to be five and a half weeks, not eight weeks. We could have miscalculated how far along you are . . . or it could be a miscarriage.”
After you’d wiped yourself clean and buttoned your jeans, your doctor returned with the smile of a professional giver of pain. You nodded and thanked her as she handed you orders for blood samples, papers to cover the maternity packet in your lap. You may have even managed to smile as you and your husband left the office and walked across the street to your Subaru.
Once the car door closed, you cried. You cried while your husband drove you the ten minutes home. You cried as he clicked off the engine. You both cried as you sat in the car. You did not share words.
Your husband went to a church meeting that evening, though he said he’d stay if you asked him to. You said no, you were okay.
You knew what to do. Episode after episode of Friends, no stopping.
This was your normalcy.
This was your numbing.
This was your choice.
This was how your mom survived, and this is how you will survive.
Monica’s dad giving her his sportscar out of guilt for favoring Ross for decades. Rachel panicking at turning thirty without a husband or any real prospects. Phoebe and Rachel forgetting to plan Monica’s bridal show. Chandler believing his fiancée is pregnant.
You were only interrupted by Netflix itself.
Are you still watching?
Hannah Comerford is an editor and writer whose poetry, creative nonfiction, and fiction have appeared in The Unmooring, Ekstasis, and Fathom, among others. She holds an MFA from the Rainier Writing Workshop, where she is now Program Assistant, and she is currently a Visiting Instructor at Pacific Lutheran Unviersity. She also serves as Associate Poetry Editor for Fathom. Hannah lives with her husband, son, and dog in Tacoma, WA.