Speaking to the Dead

As humans, mortality is never far away.

I speak to the dead. Do you? 

Not a day goes by that I don’t have something to tell my mother, who died last Christmas, and I know she’s listening, happy to continue our conversations. It’s been almost three years since the passing of my father, an inveterate baseball fan. But when the Giants picked a new manager last week, I was eager to discuss the news with him. 

My mother, who converted to Judaism, was born in Tennessee and raised in rural Michigan during the Depression. She had a great understanding of the spiritual. She once sent me a wooden plaque that says, “Be the kind of woman who, when your feet hit the floor each morning, the Devil says, ‘Oh, crap! She's up!’ ” And she meant it. 

Speaking with the dead bridges two worlds. As we usher in November, we enter a season when the barrier between the living and the dead thins, and we can communicate more closely with our departed loved ones. The season of Scorpio and Mars is about darkness and light and the shadowy world in between. Most of us know this time on the calendar as Halloween, but it also goes by Samhain, All Hallow’s Eve, All Saint’s Day, and Dia de los Muertos, or Day of the Dead, which falls on Nov. 2. 

Last February, I had the pleasure of visiting Mexico City and Oaxaca and saw firsthand how the dead are never far away in Mexican culture. There is much to admire about Mexico—more than I could ever write about in one column— but Mexico City is a good place to begin. It's a city with a capital C, full of arts and culture, millennia of history, and an inherent beauty that imbues it with a grandness afforded to only a few places on the globe. 

Maybe it was my mom’s death on Christmas Day and the grief that followed, but arriving in Mexico City two months later accentuated her absence. It was precisely the kind of place I liked to share with her.

Standing in front of a magnificent Diego Rivera mural in his namesake museum, I was captivated by a detail of the artist clasping hands with Death. Why did Rivera portray himself in this way? I’m sure art historians have an answer. For me, it meant he understood that, as humans, mortality is never far away. We might as well make peace with it. 

In Mexican culture, the dead are just across a bridge, not an impassable chasm. Seeing ghosts is often portrayed as something scary. Not so on the Day of the Dead, where once a year, you can commune with the departed, bring them gifts, and honor your relatives and ancestors. 

Death is also a frequent theme in the final installment of my “Woman King” trilogy, which will be republished under a new name by the time the third book comes out in 2025. I don’t think it is much of a spoiler to say that the novel is a meditation on death, either chasing it or facing it. Given the characters in the trilogy — Olivia especially and her penchant for trouble  —  it’s not surprising that death would be a major theme. But now, as I work on a second draft to send to my editor, writing about death and the people we leave behind feels more poignant. When I started to write these stories, all of my parents were alive, and there was no pandemic. What a difference three years makes. 

Returning from Mexico, I brought back more than beautiful souvenirs and mezcal. I decided to borrow their tradition and carry my mother and father in my heart and at my side. Their presence feels as natural as the air I breathe. Having them with me lessens my sadness and allows me to celebrate their lives by living mine. I do speak to the dead. I hope you do, too. In a few days time, if you listen closely, they might even answer you back.