******************** POSTING RULES & NOTES ********************
#1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
#2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived.
#3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern.
*****************************************************************
(From his son.)
First, thanks so much to all who sent condolences, tributes, and other
kinds of support when Hunter passed on. It was overwhelming, and I don’t
think we’ll ever be able to respond to everyone who wrote, called, and
posted on social media. I’m sending this to Redbadbear but please
forward to other lists and individuals if you can.
__ __
Right after Hunter died, the phone started ringing, and we fielded calls
from old friends, colleagues, a couple of former enemies, long-lost
family members. And the media. We talked to The Washington Post, the
Associated Press, National Public Radio, many newspapers, television
stations, and so on. We expected his passing would be noted, but the
level of interest was astonishing. My brother Peter and I handled the
interviews and felt like old hands after a few days. Yet we felt Hunter,
a stickler for accuracy, watching, not uncritically, as we answered
questions. I made about six pages of notes before I talked to the guy
from the Washington Post.
__ __
About four days before he died, Hunter moved into the phase they
describe as “actively dying.” That is, his breathing would stop for a
long time before starting again dramatically. He slipped into
semi-consciousness, seldom opening his eyes, and seemed to have moved
beyond understanding us in terms of language. He did respond to touch,
and reacted nonverbally when we talked to him, and reacted when my
brother, not yet on the scene, talked to him through the phone. He was
no longer eating or drinking. When his doctor came, he predicted Hunter
would last three days at the most based on his experience.
__ __
Maria and Josie and I were there with him nonstop during this period.
Every hour that came we believed would be his last. It was intense. The
breathing became frighteningly irregular. He did not seem to be in any
pain, but was going through some kind of psychic storm, moving
restlessly, sometimes reaching for something, sometimes raising his
fist. To me, in this state, Hunter was sort of suspended between life
and death. That’s the only way I can describe it.
__ __
We made sure, through each day and night, that one of us was always
awake, almost always holding his hand or arm. We played music for him,
his favorite labor songs, like “Which Side Are You On?” as well as some
traditional Micmac songs that emphasized drumming. We talked to him a
great deal. These were strange nights, but very beautiful nights. He
reached and passed his doctor’s predicted death day, not surprising
given his refusal to let anyone tell him how to live. Or die.
__ __
Hunter’s last act was to think of others before himself. On Monday
morning, he seemed to be as stable as we could expect him to be. Maria
and Josie decided to make a quick errand; they hadn’t left the house in
days. I was in the kitchen when they left and wandered in to check on
Hunter in the living room, where his hospital bed was. I sat by him and
reached over to rub his arm and (with my apologies for being graphic) he
expelled some black bile from his mouth. I grabbed our suction device,
much like a dentist’s suction tube, to clear the back of his mouth. It
was at that moment I realized he’d stopped breathing. He was gone. I
called Maria and Josie, told them it didn’t look good, that they needed
to return. I had time to clean up the bile before they returned. They’d
been gone all of five minutes.
__ __
We believe that Hunter waited until they were gone to die. They were
distraught enough already, and seeing that final unpleasant bodily
function would have just been too much for them. It was something I
could handle, and he knew it.
__ __
So that’s that. He has left an enormous void in our family, and in the
lives of many others, and in the universe itself.. It seems
incomprehensible that someone so much larger than life is simply gone.
We’re still sorting it all out.
__ __
I will say this last thing, though. Hunter was very open minded about
the possibilities when it came to life after death, though he was not an
adherent to any single belief in that arena. Not long before he died, we
were on the subject of reincarnation. If there /was/ reincarnation, I
asked him, upon his death would he want to take a nice long rest or get
right back out there into the world and get to work.
__ __
I’m sure you know what his answer was.
__ __
Thanks,
__ __
John Salter
_________________________________________________________
Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm
Set your options at:
https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
