Losing my mom and manifesting a 2023 goal
Hello, friends. It’s been almost five months since I’ve sent a newsletter but I didn’t want to leave 2022 without checking in.
As most of you probably know, my mom, Susanne Jonas, passed away on August 31 after being hospitalized with pneumonia for 3 weeks. Here’s the unofficial obituary I put together for the celebration of life I organized for her in November:
And a few other tributes published this past fall:
UC Santa Cruz (where she taught for 24 years): https://news.ucsc.edu/2022/09/susanne-jonas-in-memoriam.html?fbclid=IwAR39hgK8IONECYYDYs2Zb4yqoMZgoVu6VObOESqSE7fatBzgpXlTnaZdIwo
Prensa Libre, a Guatemalan newspaper (in Spanish): https://www.prensalibre.com/opinion/columnasdiarias/de-centauros-y-palomas/
Until mid-November, I was pretty consumed with cleaning out my mom’s apartment and planning a celebration of her life. And then, the holidays. I also just haven’t had much emotional space to write since she died. I’m still working through my feelings, but they’ve just been a real mix of wondering whether I could have done more to prevent her death, and knowing that her health had been declining for awhile and she needed more help than she was willing to admit. On top of a serious diagnosis she received a year ago (I’m still debating how much to reveal because she was very hesitant to let people know about it), she went into the hospital malnourished and was eating very little while hospitalized, despite constant attempts by me and and two friends who visited regularly. Her mental state was altered throughout most of her stay (she was often delirious and agitated), but I believe at a certain point she made a conscious decision to refuse food. She was also saying things that pointed to a desire to end her suffering. I think she may have decided she wasn’t up for a life of increasing dependency and disability.
I was able to sit with my mom the day before she died and say goodbye in a way—I played her Schubert’s 4-hand piano Fantasie in F minor, a piece I worked on with my grandma Tutu years ago. But we weren’t able to have any meaningful conversations because of her delirium and I have regrets about things I left unsaid. We had a difficult/tense relationship, and I wasn’t able to get past a lot of things she did. I was hard on her. I don’t think my anger was misplaced, but I wish I’d been able to recognize the positive aspects of our relationship more often. I wish I’d been able to tell her how proud I was of her professional accomplishments and lifelong commitment to making the world a more just place.
During the celebration of life event, my dad spoke about how fearless my mom was when they met as very young adults at Harvard. He talked about how her passion for politics and exposing U.S. imperialism in Latin America changed the trajectory of his life and career as a doctor. Also that day, another longtime friend of my parents revealed that Noam Chomsky once told him, “I would not be an activist if it wasn’t for Susanne Jonas.” I wish I had been able to tell her that she contributed a great deal to the world and left an indelible mark as a pioneering scholar of Guatemalan and Central American politics and migration.
On a more personal note, I wish my mom and I had been able to watch old movies together in recent years, like we did when I was a teenager. She loved classic film. I remember going to see old movies at the Castro Theater with her back when it was one of the best historic movie palaces in the country and before it was taken over by a big production company that plans to change its historic layout to maximize profit. My mom introduced me to Hitchcock films (Rear Window remains one of my all-time favorites), Casablanca, The Thin Man, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, The Wizard of Oz, Gone With the Wind, and Breakfast at Tiffany’s.
My mom influenced me in ways I really wasn’t able to recognize before she died. I think I’ll be sitting with this realization for quite some time.
My goal for 2023: starting a podcast
I’ve always been hesitant to make resolutions for the New Year, because it often feels like too much pressure, or maybe because I’m afraid I won’t meet my goal. But I want to try manifesting this goal, putting it out into the universe to see what comes back.
I’ve had an idea for a podcast for a long time (probably a year at least) and I’ve been a total chickenshit about trying to make it happen. I’m so good at talking myself out of things I want to do, which I think comes from being a deeply analytical person who likes to look at all the angles before making a decision. But it’s also because I’m scared I’ll fail. There are so many reasons I’ve given myself about why starting a podcast won’t end up working out:
there are already too many podcasts, it’s too late to get into the market, the market is already saturated
I’m not interesting enough a personality/not outgoing enough/too self-conscious to attract an audience
Maybe my idea actually isn’t that interesting/novel or isn’t suited to a podcast
I’m much more eloquent on the page than in spontaneous interviews/public speaking, and I have so many verbal tics, that it won’t sound good
I want to co-host a podcast with someone else (I want it to be more conversational) and I’m not sure how to go about finding that person
Admittedly, these are all good reasons to doubt whether starting a podcast is a realistic goal for me, and it’s not bad to be practical about taking on big projects. But after putting the idea away for many months, recently I felt the desire to try and go for it, to try something new that may include a big learning curve.
I don’t want my often self-defeating internal monologue to prevent me from taking something on that could be really fulfilling. I want to be braver in 2023.
(Needless to say, if you have any experience starting a podcast, I’d love any insights you could provide.)
Wishing all of you the very best for the New Year
XOXO