Episode 12: Facing the Veil: Our Personal Journeys with Death

**TRIGGER WARNING** This episode contains content that may be disturbing to some listeners such as animal death, suicide, suicidal ideation, as well as prolonged conversations about deaths of real people. If you are not in a place to listen to this type of content we understand and suggest you skip this one. Keep yourselves safe <3

Join the coven as we delve into a deeply personal and introspective conversation about our individual experiences with death and the afterlife. In this episode, we shed a little bit of the playful banter and explore the profound impact death has had on our lives, from childhood encounters to more recent losses. We share intimate stories of how we've navigated grief, confronted mortality, and ultimately found solace and wisdom in the face of the inevitable. This episode offers a raw and honest glimpse into our personal journeys with death, inviting listeners to reflect on their own experiences and find comfort in shared vulnerability. Tune in for a conversation that explores the profound depths of mortality and the transformative power of facing the veil. 

If you would like to skip the hypothetical and jump right into today's topic go to- 29:45

Don't forget to subscribe, rate, and review! Join our community of listeners as we explore the mysteries of the afterlife through the lens of witchcraft.
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Transcript

Poppy 0:16

How is a Pgan Anant? Am I prate?

River 0:22

am I preganinate? How, where, where is, how is babby formed?

Poppy 0:28

is baby

River 0:30

Y'all remember that? For all my old millennials out there? Ugh.

Poppy 0:35

Yahoo. Answers I loved Yahoo. Answers

River 0:39

were so bad. I loved them.

Poppy 0:43

Uh, is it freezing where you guys are?

River 0:46

I mean, it's definitely cold.

Poppy 0:48

Absolutely

River 0:49

27 degrees when I woke up this morning.

Poppy 0:53

me check the weather, actually. It was I have not been outside today. To be fully transparent. I have

River 0:59

I'm trying

Poppy 1:00

my morning walks.

Skye 1:01

yesterday was like 40s, I think, for us.

River 1:04

In the

Poppy 1:05

is

River 1:05

yeah.

Poppy 1:06

It is 28 degrees right now. Low of 22.

Skye 1:10

Whoa,

Poppy 1:12

Yeah.

River 1:13

Kinda

Skye 1:14

we're at a, we're at a cool 47

Poppy 1:17

Oh!

River 1:18

not bad, not

Poppy 1:19

Wish that was me.

River 1:20

Yeah, it's been real cold in the mornings and then it's gotten about 20 degrees warmer in the afternoon.

Poppy 1:26

Man, no. It's like,

River 1:29

It's supposed to snow next week a little bit, apparently. Like next Saturday, I think.

Poppy 1:35

it's supposed to snow here too, I think. I guess we're having the same front moving through, um, just higher elevation. Yeah.

Skye 1:44

Do you have a little game for us today?

Poppy 1:47

Oh shit. Are we in? We're doing it?

River 1:49

Oh, welcome to our podcast, everybody.

Poppy 1:52

Hello, welcome to Death Coven, happy to have you. this is episode twelve, and in case you're new here, this is a witchcraft podcast. Uh, we are a death coven, and we talk about death and death adjacent things, what it's like to be in a death coven, sometimes haunting, sometimes Existential questions. Who knows what you're gonna get. Sometimes history. Sometimes cats.

River 2:18

Sometimes

Poppy 2:19

Foreshadowing. Sometimes cowboys. Um, so yeah, welcome. Uh, my name is Poppy.

River 2:24

I'm River.

Skye 2:25

and I'm Skye.

Poppy 2:26

And today we're going to be talking about, well, today's kind of a conversational episode, so we don't have anything prepared. It's just one of those where we have a topic and we kind of just go off and, and see what happens.

Skye 2:42

Yeah, I posed this to the coven because I was like, well, since we're a death coven, we haven't really stated our views on death. We haven't really talked very much on our personal experiences really with death, our views and opinions and beliefs on death and I mean, it's kind of a What's the word I'm looking for? A nebulous topic. There's not really one specific concrete answer I think for any of us, but I just thought it would be fun if we could Have a conversation about You know, our experiences with death, what our

River 3:20

Cause I don't think we've ever even really talked about this off mic with each other.

Poppy 3:25

I feel like Skye and I have had, like, drunken 1am conversations, but

Skye 3:32

but the

River 3:32

not been privy to it.

Poppy 3:34

No, yeah, I mean, those are mostly, like, speculative, like, dude, what if?

River 3:40

How fucked up would it be if you came back and you were a buuuuug?

Skye 3:45

I have a, I have a loose structure, not really structure, but I have some prodding questions for the two

Poppy 3:52

Yeah. Skye's kind of leading this one.

Skye 3:56

kind of, sorta. I just decided on this episode topic. So I'm going to take the wheel a little bit just to kind of steer us in the right direction a little bit.

Poppy 4:06

Yeah. But before we get started, I do have a little bit of a gimme gammy, a little game. Um, and last episode I gave you guys a choice, uh, between two. I said, do you want to go a little bit nuts or do you want to learn a little bit more about what we each have locked

Skye 4:27

And we

Poppy 4:27

in our hearts and

River 4:29

went crazy.

Poppy 4:32

So this one might be for you. Take you a little bit by surprise. Okay, so what we're going to do, We, this, this involves taking, taking our headphones off and being blind for a little, for a little bit.

River 4:50

Okay,

Poppy 4:51

So what we're doing, we are all on death row. We're about to die. We're

Skye 4:59

I had a feeling this one would be more relevant

River 5:01

what is my crime?

Poppy 5:05

up to interpretation. Are you guilty? Are you not guilty? I

River 5:07

Being a nasty little

Poppy 5:08

that. Yeah, being too sexy. They just have to get rid of me. Anyway, so it's your last day. It's your last meal. So, what we're gonna do is, uh, River, you're gonna take off your headphones, and Sky's gonna tell us what she thinks your last meal would be. Okay.

Skye 5:29

We're gonna play the newlywed game?

Poppy 5:31

We're going to play the newlywed game with last meals. And so, the two of us, like, we're going to do two at a time. So like, me and Skye will talk about what we think River's last meal will be. River and Skye will talk about mine. Um, me and River will talk about Skye's. And then, um, When they come back on, they'll, they'll say, you know, what they think.

Skye 5:51

I don't even know

Poppy 5:52

what they would want.

River 5:54

I, yeah, I, I've

Poppy 5:55

take a minute. let's take a minute. Let's think about it. Okay, we got ten seconds on the clock. Ha ha ha ha ha. The magic of editing, the magic of editing.

Skye 6:07

Okay.

Poppy 6:08

Let's actually, do you have something to write with? Like, let's write it down right now.

River 6:13

I can grab something. Well, I have my

Poppy 6:14

Let's do, just to give it some more structure, let's do like a main, a drink, and a dessert. Is River googling right now?

River 6:23

No, I'm typing on my phone. I did have to Google something. I had to Google a brand name to spell it right.

Poppy 6:29

Oh.

River 6:30

I got it. This was easier than I thought it would be.

Skye 6:33

did you guys add extra stuff or did you keep it three simple like boom boom boom

Poppy 6:38

My main has two parts, I

Skye 6:40

Okay. I

River 6:41

My dessert has two components. But the drink and the main are pretty straightforward.

Poppy 6:48

I will also say, just for transparency, the three of my things do not go together. It's, it's not a cohesive, It's just like, if these are the last three, yeah, it's what I want. But it's not, like, if I went to a restaurant, they would not present these three things together. At all. Okay.

Skye 7:10

and get all of these things, I

River 7:11

I could go to one restaurant and get two of these things, but the third one I'm gonna have to

Poppy 7:17

Same.

Skye 7:19

Okay, I'm like, how do I? I'm locked in, but I, I'm like, how do I preface this? mine, I guess I, I guess I can, but I,

River 7:29

I guess so. Well take your, take your dang headphone out so that we can

Skye 7:34

No, but I have caveats because I want you to be able to guess. So I have, I'm, I'm picturing I'm like in, they like make a little like restaurant

Poppy 7:45

In your cell?

Skye 7:46

Yeah, like, and they're gonna, they're gonna come serve me. So I have, because this is how I, I go out to eat. I have a starter cocktail,

Poppy 7:55

hmm. Mm

Skye 7:57

have a beverage with my main. That's different from my starter cocktail.

Poppy 8:01

hmm.

Skye 8:02

And my main is a little two parter, but they do go together hand in hand. That's all I'll say about that. It's sort of like a this and this. A blank and blank. And then I have a dessert.

River 8:14

okay.

Skye 8:15

Okay. Taking headphones out now. I'll

Poppy 8:17

Take him off.

River 8:18

of here. Sick of you.

Poppy 8:20

Oh, we probably should have given her like a signal for when she should put them back in. I guess we'll just point at her ears. Okay.

River 8:29

Okay.

Poppy 8:29

the

River 8:30

Let's

Poppy 8:31

starter cocktail, definitely something with whiskey. I'm gonna say like a, like an old fashioned.

River 8:37

I was going to go old fashioned cause she loves an old fashioned. I hope she's not reading our lips right now.

Poppy 8:42

I'm just gonna go ahead and say like a smoked old fashioned.

River 8:46

That seems safe.

Poppy 8:48

Beverage with the meal has got to be some kind of wine.

River 8:52

She loves that. What's the one that butter cab Sav? She loves that wine.

Poppy 8:57

Yeah, it's probably gonna be a red wine, I think. So, which is gonna pair with her mane.

River 9:04

Yes.

Poppy 9:05

Which really, that's gonna, that's the tricky part, I think.

River 9:09

What could she possibly want as a

Poppy 9:12

wait, hold up. She does love the buttercab, however, if this is her last meal, I think she's gonna go with a, like a fancy champagne.

River 9:20

Okay. That's

Poppy 9:21

She might go with like, a tattinger.

River 9:23

can get the butter cab Sav

Poppy 9:25

Yeah, she can get that in the afterlife, whatever. I think she's gonna go with a tattinger champagne.

River 9:29

Okay. I don't know that much about alcohol, so you're carrying

Poppy 9:32

be a Prosecco, I don't know. Definitely a fancy champagne.

River 9:35

Yeah.

Poppy 9:37

Meal. Pasta of some sort?

River 9:39

Maybe. I don't think it would be eggs.'cause she's got that egg intolerance, but maybe it's like her last meal and she's like, fuck it, I'm gonna eat a shit

Poppy 9:46

think she likes eggs enough for it to be like her last meal, though.

River 9:49

I could see a pasta. I could see her getting a nice champagne and a pasta meal somewhere.

Poppy 9:55

Do you think Because she has the shellfish allergy, she'd be like, you know what, let's do calamari, like, one last

River 10:02

Why not? I'm gonna die anyway. Maybe.

Poppy 10:07

Okay, we'll do like calamari and okay, let's Do you just want to go with like, blanket pasta dish? Is that cheating? Okay, blanket pasta dish. Dessert, strawberry shortcake.

River 10:17

It's gotta be the strawberry shortcake. It has to be the strawberry shortcake.

Poppy 10:24

by a nice champagne and a pasta dish.

River 10:26

And

Poppy 10:27

Oh, she's leaving. And calamari.

River 10:29

Are we locked in? I think we got it.

Poppy 10:31

think we got him. Okay.

River 10:33

Headphones back on. Come back to us, beautiful.

Poppy 10:36

Alright.

Skye 10:38

Question. Am I going to reveal right away? Or are we going to do all of us and then reveal at

River 10:41

I assumed we were gonna like, guess. Will you reveal now? We don't guess and see how close we got.

Poppy 10:47

I feel like she needs to tell us because she hasn't, like for integrity's sake. Yeah.

River 10:54

Yeah.

Skye 10:55

Okay.

River 10:55

ahead.

Skye 10:56

Okay, so mine is very simple and I feel like that might surprise the two of you, but also in a way probably not. My first little cocktail before I get into my, my last meal is a margarita made by me.

River 11:10

Fuck, damn it.

Poppy 11:12

Interesting. Okay. I said smoked old fashioned.

Skye 11:16

Okay, that's good. I thought old fashioned for a second, but I was like, my own margarita.

River 11:20

I want that before I go.

Skye 11:22

the main spaghetti and garlic bread.

Poppy 11:25

Okay. Alright. We did say pasta. Yeah, we said pasta Okay. We couldn't decide what kind of pasta, but we did say it was, it would be pasta.

Skye 11:36

Classic. Did you bring up garlic bread?

River 11:38

No, We did not. Was that your second component?

Skye 11:42

Yeah, like spaghetti and garlic bread.

Poppy 11:44

We felt like it was gonna be Italian, so we said, like, pasta and then calamari because you were gonna die anyway.

Skye 11:51

of my death. anyway, it to pair with that, I picked the jam sellers cab.

River 11:56

Oh, damn it.

Skye 11:58

What did we

Poppy 11:59

said that. River

River 12:00

I said buttercab, cause you

Poppy 12:03

Yes, River said Butter Cabin, I was like, you know what, she can get that like whenever, so I said she's gonna do like a special champagne, or like a, like a tattinger, yeah,

Skye 12:16

I do like tidinger. Yeah,

Poppy 12:18

or a

Skye 12:18

good. Vove. Nah, tidinger is better. and for dessert, I'm doing tiramisu.

River 12:24

Are you?

Skye 12:26

I

Poppy 12:26

really? We said Strawberry Shortcake.

Skye 12:29

That's a great guess. That's very me,

River 12:32

I'm remembering now how much you love tiramisu.

Skye 12:34

do love tiramisu.

River 12:35

Yeah.

Skye 12:36

I could go to an Italian restaurant and order a margarita, I could easily have this dinner. I've had this dinner many times. you know, my husband's Italian. It would make me think of him in that last moment, you know, were I not to see him and it's just a easy, delicious, hearty, tried and true meal that like, I can trust, I would have a very good filling last meal. That's simple, but delicious.

Poppy 12:57

I would say that we got, like, second place

River 13:00

I would give us, I

Poppy 13:02

for you.

River 13:02

C.

Skye 13:04

you all you all picked things that are like I would have picked that like you get points for like knowing me like that is those are valid answers job. You guys.

Poppy 13:14

Nice. Who's next? I guess I'll go next.

River 13:17

Yeah, go on ahead. Do you have

Poppy 13:19

Okay. I'll say for my, for my beverage, I'm gonna have three of them.

River 13:26

Okay.

Skye 13:27

each course, like you have like a boom, boom, boom.

Poppy 13:29

Throughout the course of my meal, yeah, I'll have three. No, it's gonna be the same beverage, but I wanna have it three times. Um,

Skye 13:37

joking, right? Because I, I have a drink in mind and I'm like, I wouldn't put it past her to

Poppy 13:42

You'll see. You'll see. Um, for my main, I have a, it's like a two part, but they're from the same, like you could get them both at the same restaurant, and I have before. and then the last one, You know, you'll, the dessert, whatever,

River 13:57

Yeah.

Poppy 13:58

maybe no, maybe

River 13:58

I have an idea.

Poppy 14:00

Okay.

River 14:01

away. Be gone with ye.

Skye 14:04

Clamato.

River 14:05

It's gotta be because she's so nasty with the Climato. She loves those things. Yeah. Yeah.

Skye 14:11

Okay.

River 14:12

Of those two. Is she drinking three? I thought she was

Skye 14:15

three, three

River 14:16

one thing.

Skye 14:17

No, I think that was a joke,

River 14:19

Okay.

Skye 14:19

but I think she's saying like, I could, but, and then a third, I feel like she would do like a red wine, like she would do like a classic wine,

River 14:27

Yeah.

Skye 14:28

but Clamato is for sure

River 14:29

It's gotta be on there.

Skye 14:30

one.

River 14:31

of course she wants to drink that.

Skye 14:32

that's on there. Um, I feel like it'd be like, Prosecco to start. Clamato, like, with the main. And then like a little glass of wine with dessert. Like that's that's the vibe for Poppy. For the main, It's giving sushi the way that she said it. Ordering multiple things at one place. I

River 14:50

Mm hmm. She

Skye 14:52

rolls.

River 14:53

Her and Michael devoured that sushi boat.

Skye 14:57

Yeah, and I feel like she probably didn't think about a sushi boat, but I feel like that's actually the correct answer, but i'm saying um, Spicy salmon roll

River 15:05

Okay.

Skye 15:07

and maybe an unagi. Because she had unagi the other day, didn't she? She had eel.

River 15:12

I think she did, yes, yes.

Skye 15:15

But she also did say these are two things that you can order at the same restaurant, not that they're two variations of the same thing.

River 15:20

Mm hmm.

Skye 15:21

So we should come up with another Asian dish, I

River 15:26

Does she like dumplings? Does she like gyoza? Oh, oh, oh, wait, fuck me, those tofu sticky buns that we got at Ostara.

Skye 15:37

There's no way she remembered that.

River 15:39

Are you sure?

Skye 15:40

I doubt it because I didn't and it would have been online.

River 15:44

Yeah, I didn't remember it either. Those are so fucking good, dude.

Skye 15:48

But we should, we should say them as an honorable mention, as like a, as like an addendum.

River 15:55

Yeah.

Skye 15:56

Okay, I feel like it's safer for us to go with those two roles

River 15:59

Yeah.

Skye 16:00

for the main, but I feel like there's something missing. Let maybe let's move on to dessert and circle

River 16:05

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you think it would be the strawberry cookies that she makes for dessert?

Skye 16:11

I don't know if she would pick something that she makes

River 16:14

I don't know. But they are good and everybody loves them. And they are her favorite thing to make.

Skye 16:20

but also I think that maybe she's tired of them because she makes them so often because she always makes a bunch and she gives a bunch away Because she like she just likes making shit and giving and feeding people I don't know if she necessarily is like this is my favorite dessert. It's her favorite to make

River 16:36

Yeah. I don't really know. I don't really know that she has much of a sweet tooth for as long as I've known her. Obviously you've known her a million times longer than I have. Mm hmm. But I do know she used to eat crushed up sprinkles off the counter.

Skye 16:52

a joke I should Yeah, I should say that, uh, we just hand her like a, if we're curating it, I give her just an, uh, a raw packet of Swiss Miss because she's known for just eating hot cocoa powder.

River 17:06

so nasty, love her.

Skye 17:08

Oh, if you were to ask for a dessert, what would you give Poppy? What would she ask for?

River 17:14

She's not really a chocolate girly,

Skye 17:17

take us out of left field on the dessert. I really feel like it's gonna be like triple fudge death by chocolate

River 17:22

Something like that. It's like rocky road ice cream. Does she, because I remember her burp And Rachel's husband both really, really, really liking the Rice Krispie Treats. Do you think she likes them more than the strawberry cookies?

Skye 17:37

we'll go out to places, like a coffee shop or whatever, and if she sees a Rice Krispie Treat, she will pick it

River 17:43

Okay, it's

Skye 17:44

So I think,

River 17:45

Treat then.

Skye 17:46

I think, I think we have to pick that. Okay, so we're gonna go for drinks, we're gonna go Clamato, Prosecco, and a glass of Cab. For the main, we're gonna go two Sushi Rolls, a Spicy Salmon, and an Unagi.

River 18:00

Honorable mention that sesame tofu bun.

Skye 18:04

And then, for dessert I

River 18:07

yeah.

Skye 18:07

feel good about that.

River 18:09

I feel really good about that.

Skye 18:10

You're gonna be a tricky one, though.

River 18:13

I know, even looking at my list I was like, I don't know if they're gonna be able to get this.

Skye 18:17

a little bastard.

River 18:18

Yeah. And what about it? And you love me. on

Skye 18:22

Alright.

River 18:23

girl.

Poppy 18:24

Okay. Well, I, I have to tell you guys, right?

River 18:27

right, right, right, right.

Poppy 18:28

Yeah. I don't know. I don't know if you're gonna guess.

River 18:31

Well, see, we tried really hard. We put a lot of thought into this.

Poppy 18:36

For my drink, I'm also gonna have a Sky Margarita.

River 18:42

Okay, okay. Oh, okay.

Poppy 18:47

Yeah.

Skye 18:47

Oh, I thought that was a joke.

Poppy 18:49

Oh no, I'm gonna want three of them

Skye 18:52

Oh, we

River 18:53

All right. Then we get a big ol

Poppy 18:56

Oh, okay. Well, I mean, if you pick three of them, it was like Prosecco

Skye 19:02

Yep.

Poppy 19:03

and a Sky Marg and

Skye 19:05

why don't you just let us say it?

Poppy 19:07

Okay, okay, okay. Some kind of wine.

Skye 19:09

To start it'd be a clamato

Poppy 19:12

yeah. Yeah, that's a good

Skye 19:15

then prosecco and then like a cab

Poppy 19:17

Yeah.

Skye 19:18

are the three

Poppy 19:19

Okay. Clamato was a good a good choice.

Skye 19:22

Did you think of my margaritas independent of me thinking of my margaritas?

Poppy 19:26

Yeah. They're that good my fiance is always like, you're never happy with margaritas that we get out. And I'm always like, because I've had the best. Because I, because I know what I want.

Skye 19:41

Onto the main

Poppy 19:42

Um, Maine. Two parts. First part. Nabe yaki udon. Delicious, rich broth udon noodles. You know, maybe like some seafood in there.

Skye 19:57

we're in the right we're in the right sphere,

River 19:59

We're in,

Poppy 20:00

Okay.

River 20:01

circles.

Skye 20:02

let you finish

Poppy 20:03

Second part, we've got some, um, salmon sashimi and rice.

Skye 20:08

close

Poppy 20:09

Some raw salmon, some like soy sauce in there, maybe some pickled veg. Yeah, what did you guys say?

Skye 20:17

Spicy Salmon Sushi and Unagi.

Poppy 20:20

Oh, yeah, that was

River 20:21

But also, honorable mention, those, uh, tofu sesame steamed buns we got at Astara. Yeah, brother.

Skye 20:32

I was like, she didn't

Poppy 20:33

forget.

Skye 20:34

have seen the reaction on her face had she remembered

Poppy 20:36

It's been zero days since I've thought about the steam buns.

River 20:40

They're so good.

Poppy 20:41

They're so good. Oh,

Skye 20:47

dessert first.

Poppy 20:49

um,

Skye 20:49

stumped us, I want to tell you, like, we really were

Poppy 20:52

I'm not really,

River 20:53

to figure it out.

Poppy 20:55

I'm not a sweet person. Like I had a bunch of different things kind of passed by my mind and I was like, you know, I'm not like a super, I'm not super into that, but. I think for my last meal, I would want a brownie sundae.

Skye 21:10

See, I knew it was going to be some shit like that.

River 21:12

She did. She did say that.

Poppy 21:17

was your guess?

River 21:18

Rice Krispie treat.

Poppy 21:20

Oh yeah, that's also a good

Skye 21:22

Yeah.

Poppy 21:22

a Rice Krispie Treat.

River 21:24

But Sky was like, it's gonna be something out of Left Field, like triple fudge death by chocolate bullshit.

Skye 21:30

don't

Poppy 21:31

I'm not like a huge chocolate person, yeah, no.

River 21:34

say that!

Poppy 21:35

But it's, so the brownie sundae is not because I want the chocolate, it's because I want the hot cold juxtaposition with the gooey element,

Skye 21:45

It makes sense. It's a good last dessert,

River 21:49

Mm hmm, and they do not go together, any of them whatsoever.

Poppy 21:52

No, no, margarita with Japanese food, and then uh, but I would eat it up, I would love it.

River 22:01

you be having the time of your life.

Poppy 22:03

Yeah, that's me. Alright, time for River.

River 22:08

right, bye everybody, I love you, I'll miss you.

Poppy 22:11

Bye!

Skye 22:13

I,

Poppy 22:14

is really hard, because

Skye 22:16

I told

River 22:16

Oh no, I can still hear it.

Skye 22:18

on,

River 22:19

down, volume down.

Skye 22:21

mute. Okay, I was telling River that they're a little bastard while we were talking. I was like, you're gonna be the hardest one because you're a little bastard.

Poppy 22:30

Yeah, because of all of the Because they have so many, like, intolerances that I'm like, I don't know what you actually like to eat. I don't know.

Skye 22:38

would they give it up on the last meal?

Poppy 22:41

Oh, absolutely. Yeah. They're gonna be doing, like, cheese and garlic and

Skye 22:48

maybe,

Poppy 22:49

maybe, Maybe, like a pasta alfredo. Like a really, like,

Skye 22:55

Like

Poppy 22:55

dense cream and garlic, and cheese.

Skye 23:00

But the way that they were talking about a specific brand of something

Poppy 23:05

I feel like that would be the dessert, though.

Skye 23:07

It might be the drink actually

Poppy 23:10

Okay.

Skye 23:12

because I turned them on to this specific brand of wine called Oyster Bay Sauvignon Blanc

Poppy 23:19

Mm hmm.

Skye 23:20

might be that because I know they're

Poppy 23:22

little freak.

Skye 23:23

they're a white wine. I don't know that they're too They've told me in the past that as far as liquor and mixed drinks go they don't really care You Like they'll happily drink gin and I fucking hate that shit. I know you've drank gin before too. It's just I don't think it'll be a liquor based drink. I think it's a white wine,

Poppy 23:40

You think it's alcoholic? Could it just be like,

Skye 23:44

Water on your deathbed.

Poppy 23:46

no, or like milk? I don't know, like a

Skye 23:50

I don't I don't think so. I don't think so I think it's like a white wine

Poppy 23:54

think it's

Skye 23:55

pair

Poppy 23:55

Okay. Mm

Skye 23:56

yeah, It's got to be an indulgence factor of like something that they haven't been able to eat in a long time that they're like You know what? gonna have it one more time.

Poppy 24:07

Yeah.

Skye 24:09

I'm trying to dive into their mind palace though, and I'm like. Cause it's not mac and cheese I don't think, but it's in that same vein.

Poppy 24:17

hmm.

Skye 24:18

Of like a thick, cause they also can't eat gluten.

Poppy 24:21

Yeah. So you don't think it's like, you don't think it's an Alfredo.

Skye 24:25

nuh mm. They do eat shrimp, it could be like a shrimp alfredo.

Poppy 24:31

Mm hmm.

Skye 24:31

That could be very delicious for them.

Poppy 24:33

But so for you, we just said like pasta dish. So we could just be like cheesy pasta dish for them.

Skye 24:41

Such, such as mac and cheese or an alfredo

Poppy 24:45

Yeah.

Skye 24:45

say we said these

Poppy 24:46

archetype. Yeah. I feel like that's, that's, okay.

Skye 24:50

happy with

Poppy 24:50

Okay, so we're, we're saying like sauvblanc. Cheesy creamy pasta dessert More difficult they like ice cream. I know that I don't know if that's like their last meal

Skye 25:03

I

Poppy 25:03

Do are they a chocolate fiend I don't I feel like they're not a chocolate person

Skye 25:11

I don't think so. I don't think that they're a fiend for chocolate. I think that they like chocolate,

Poppy 25:16

I feel like it's like a like a more niche like pistachio or like like macarons.

Skye 25:25

Ooh, they are allergic to peanuts. Maybe there's peanuts involved somehow.

Poppy 25:30

Hmm. Like a peanut butter.

Skye 25:32

Much like how you guys felt about my calamari thing where it's like, I'm dying anyway, might as well eat one less Reese's. Like, I don't know if

Poppy 25:40

They did say brand name

Skye 25:42

Maybe it's like ice cream cake.

Poppy 25:45

Mm-hmm Like a, um. Who's that one, that one brand that does it? That's it's not Dairy Queen, but it's like the Carvel. Yeah. Maybe it's like a Carvel ice cream cake,

Skye 25:56

Maybe they're just like sick and nasty and they just want like Neapolitan ice cream. I could

Poppy 26:01

Do we, do we, just want to say like,

Skye 26:03

Ice cream.

Poppy 26:05

generally like ice cream, like maybe with elements of peanut butter.

Skye 26:09

Sure.

Poppy 26:10

Okay. Okay.

Skye 26:12

super confident in them in

Poppy 26:14

No, No, they're an enigma.

Skye 26:16

yeah,

Poppy 26:16

love you though when you're listening to this. We love you so much and you're just, there's so many levels and layers to you. So much we don't know. You're

Skye 26:26

cake

Poppy 26:28

Oh yeah. I think we're going to learn something that regardless.

Skye 26:32

Oh 100

Poppy 26:33

yeah. Okay. Okay.

Skye 26:35

Okay

Poppy 26:36

They're coming back They're here.

River 26:37

now.

Poppy 26:38

Alright. Lay it down. Slap that thing down

River 26:42

Okay, so I'll start with my drink. It's a very straightforward. As I feel like, I feel kind of bad because I didn't give you guys any like qualifiers or like leads or anything. But for the listeners at home, I have a lot of dietary restrictions, so I can't eat a lot of food. One of the things I cannot consume is red wine because it gives me migraines and it upsets my tummy. But I love red wine, so that's my drink.

Skye 27:13

Oh, well, fuck. We

Poppy 27:14

sauv blanc.

River 27:16

a red wine, and you got it! Good job! Is it not? Oh. Oh, I was thinking of Caps Ave.

Poppy 27:23

Yeah.

River 27:24

a Riesling right now. Yum,

Poppy 27:28

sweet little thing.

River 27:30

yum, yum.

Poppy 27:30

Yeah, we were like, I feel like it's wine, and Skye was like, they like, saw Blanc and was talking about a Oyster Bay, like, specific brand.

River 27:40

But if it's my last

Poppy 27:42

threw us.

River 27:43

I'm going red.

Poppy 27:45

Okay, the brand thing, we were like, is it like the drink, is it the dessert, we don't know.

River 27:51

It's a little mystery.

Poppy 27:52

what's your main?

River 27:54

My main, again, with my dietary restrictions, I would be getting palak paneer with garlic naan. Because I cannot eat cheese and I cannot eat garlic.

Poppy 28:05

Okay. We said, we said like a creamy cheesy like pasta like mac

River 28:09

Mmm.

Poppy 28:10

or something like that

River 28:12

off. Palak paneer is just cheese and spinach.

Poppy 28:14

Cheese and rice, yeah.

River 28:16

rice, yeah.

Poppy 28:17

Okay.

River 28:18

It's so good, it's so

Skye 28:19

We were also kind of rocking, like, in the opposite of your dietary restrictions when we were

River 28:24

Yeah.

Skye 28:25

are they, what are

Poppy 28:26

Mm hmm.

River 28:26

If it's my last fucking meal, I'm going all out and

Poppy 28:30

Uh huh.

River 28:30

lactaid.

Poppy 28:32

Okay. And? dessert,

River 28:36

this is the two parter and this is the one I had to look up the brand name for. So there is an ice cream brand called Van Leeuwin that makes a fucking delicious, it is an Earl Grey tea ice cream. Yeah, dude.

Poppy 28:53

that.

Skye 28:53

it came across my mind and I said nothing about

River 28:56

It's so good.

Poppy 28:57

We did guess ice cream though. We, well, we said like, we said like a peanut butter, like, Carvel ice cream cake.

River 29:04

I forgot about, I'm also allergic to peanuts. I forgot. I completely did not even think

Poppy 29:08

Yeah, because, because Sky was like, well, gluten, like, there's probably like cake involved, and like, cream

River 29:15

No,

Poppy 29:16

there, like maybe

River 29:17

want that Earl Grey tea ice cream so badly. The second part is my grandma's sourdough cinnamon raisin bread. It's really delicious, and I haven't had it in years, and

Poppy 29:30

good.

River 29:30

it anymore because she's not well of health, but I would love to have some of my grandma's sourdough cinnamon raisin bread,

Poppy 29:36

get that recipe, I will make you some.

River 29:38

my mom has it now.

Poppy 29:39

Send it to me next time I come by.

River 29:41

yes, yes, yes, yes! This is the best day of my life.

Poppy 29:45

Okay. Are we ready? One and a two and three and a four start. So

Skye 29:55

to the two of you. is to kind of open us into it if you could reach back into the recesses of your brain and of your memory. What is the first instance of death that you had in your life? Was it a pet? A grandparent? Do you remember finding out? Did someone have a conversation with about what death was? Do you remember that conversation? Just like what was like your earliest memory of death? What was your introduction to death?

Poppy 30:26

I, uh, was probably five or six years old, I think. And I was playing outside and I think I've told you guys this before, but I don't think I told you about it in the context of death and like realizing what death was, So I was playing outside, and it was springtime, and I found a little blue robin's egg on the ground, as you do in the spring. And in my little child brain, I was like, oh my gosh, like, here's an egg. I need to keep it safe. I need to, you know, if I keep it safe, then I can raise it and raise this little bird by myself. And so I put it in my pocket. not realizing that it was going to get squooshed. Uh, and then later on that, I completely forgot about it, then later on that night I get into my bedroom and I'm like, you know, remember it and I'm gonna take it out and put it into a shoebox and I get everything all ready for it and then I go into my pocket And there's just a smashed egg with like, a bird fetus in my pocket that I didn't realize was there until I went to take it out. Um,

Skye 31:37

all over again.

Poppy 31:38

kind of, yeah. And I felt so guilty. I seeing it lifeless, like juxtaposed against the vision of the alive bird that I had in my brain and I realized, um, the loss of potential, I think.

Skye 32:00

you think that you knew in that moment like like you kind of immediately understood that what you were seeing meant that like you kind of were getting your own grasp on

Poppy 32:10

hmm.

Skye 32:11

in that moment?

Poppy 32:13

I, yeah, because I, because seeing it, I realized like, oh, this, this thing that I thought was going to Hatch and evolve and be alive as a bird is now No, like it doesn't it no longer has that potential like it is frozen in time as it is Right now and then of course I had to get rid of it because it was already like pretty stinky Yeah, and so I had to take it out back and like, you know But yeah, so so that realization that it was like there's this thing that in my little child Heart I felt had so much potential and just the vision to of like a bird like Specifically a bird, juxtaposed against a dead baby bird.

River 33:01

it's pretty upsetting imagery.

Poppy 33:02

Yeah, that, that did it for me.

Skye 33:05

there was, I assume that there was like, maybe not blood, but there was a red,

Poppy 33:09

No, there was blood. Yeah, it was like that weird, like, kind of watery, orangey

Skye 33:15

Yeah.

Poppy 33:15

an egg.

Skye 33:16

Yeah. I feel like you know in a sense that like, even if you have not had a conversation with an adult about what death is, you get the feeling that something is wrong, that something is off

Poppy 33:29

hmm. And with an egg, too. Because, like, the, because I knew, like, an egg, an egg, It eventually hatches and turns into a bird, but the egg that I was seeing was smashed, and the thing that was inside of it was not moving, and so it no longer was able to hatch.

Skye 33:48

It didn't have the chance or the opportunity to

Poppy 33:50

hmm.

Skye 33:51

naturally the way that it

Poppy 33:52

Yeah. And so in my brain, that is kind of like, this, this thing that was supposed to happen is now cut off, so that means it's final, it's over, and that for me was kind of like, oh, that's what death is, that ending. Mm hmm. That there's, there's no more, you can't grow anymore, you can't do anymore, it's over. Um, yeah. Mmhmm.

River 34:17

I just, I got rocked by that bird, I'm

Skye 34:19

talking about death here, dude. Like, it's not a, it's, it's an unsettling topic and it's, it's, you know, so let's talk about it.

River 34:30

I, my first encounter with death was also around the same age. I was probably in like first or second grade. I will say I did not come out of that situation with like the bone deep realization that that's what death was for a very long time afterwards. But I grew up on a street of almost exclusively older folks, older couples and older people that lived alone. My family was the only one that had kids. And we were all like pretty close with our neighbors. And I get home from school one day, it's like the end of the year, and I'm already upset because this boy that I really liked was like going home. I want to say it was, he was going back home to Puerto Rico where his family was from and I was really upset because I was gonna miss him and I was like, that's my friend and he's gonna be gone and I'm never gonna see him again. And my mom picked me up from school, took me back home, and when we're in the driveway she goes, I have something to tell you. and my next door neighbor, Mr. had passed away. And I was already really upset because my friend was leaving and I was never going to see him again. And then my next door neighbor, I'm just learning he's died. And I just remember

Poppy 35:47

with him?

River 35:48

yeah, like me and my siblings were over there constantly. They were like another set of grandparents for us. Yeah, so it was just that, like, oh god, there's more things I'm not ever gonna see again. What are you talking about? Like, I can't understand the concept that I'm not ever gonna see either of these people ever again.

Poppy 36:08

when you're that small, it doesn't, I mean, you have no concept of never.

River 36:12

Yeah. I was like, what do you mean? He was just there,

Poppy 36:16

He was just there, yeah.

River 36:18

not there anymore. What are you talking about? That's insane.

Poppy 36:21

And there's been nothing in my life up to this point that I've never gotten to experience again. Not in my living memory,

River 36:29

yeah.

Poppy 36:29

yeah.

River 36:30

So that was it. And it's still, like, I went to the funeral and everything. I didn't fully understand what was going on because I was a child and I didn't have much empathy. But I was like, everybody else is crying and like really upset. And that's making me really upset in a way that I can't understand. But I'm not fully grasping what death is at the time.

Poppy 36:52

Did you still have interactions with his wife

River 36:55

Oh, yeah. Yeah, we were still over there. A was different. She was definitely sadder, understandably, because her husband of however many decades had just died, but she was still very, she was always happy to see us

Poppy 37:09

hmm.

River 37:10

us into her home.

Poppy 37:12

That makes me really happy. Mm

Skye 37:16

Mine's a real downer. Mine's kind of a two parter.

Poppy 37:19

hmm.

Skye 37:20

Um, I would say

Poppy 37:21

Sky was

Skye 37:24

unfortunately. So, not really a direct for me, but my I mean, my parents were living here in the states, but my mom, my mom is Scottish as you guys know. Her dad died in like 2000. so Yeah, so he I mean he was like 80. He died of esophageal cancer Um, I didn't go like my mom had to like go overseas. I like stayed with family or whatever But it really I mean my grandmother passed when my mom was like 25 like before she had me so I didn't Experience that my grandfather died in 2000. So I was like six years old

Poppy 38:07

Mm hmm.

Skye 38:09

so I knew about it and it really really traumatized my mom and she went into this like big depression and all the time would be like My dad's dead. Like, it kind of became her personality, which kind of sucks, you know, like when someone big in your family dies. So I knew kind of what death was, but it didn't directly impact me. It impacted someone directly to me, but it wasn't like I was getting that first hand

River 38:38

But you couldn't quite understand why she was reacting the way she

Poppy 38:42

Yeah.

Skye 38:43

No, because I couldn't really remember my grandfather, really.

Poppy 38:47

Mm hmm. Mm

Skye 38:48

just like, oh, death is Like I think I kind of got a talking to about what death meant and why my mom was acting the way that she was I knew that it was a really sad thing

Poppy 39:00

hmm.

Skye 39:00

but the first time that I had death interacted directly to me, little backstory, I don't know if I've told either of you about this. It's kind of traumatizing

Poppy 39:11

Lore drop. Okay.

Skye 39:13

So when I was a kid, I had a fascination with the movie The Green Mile.

Poppy 39:19

Mm hmm.

Skye 39:20

So I loved the movie, The Green Mile, even as a young child. I've had lots of animals die in, in my childhood. I had many pets, many of them died. The first one to die, I had a hamster and I named him Mr. Jingles. if you've seen The Green Mile, you know that the little mouse that does tricks. Um, who, I forget what the guy's name in the movie was, but like, he's like on death row, like he's about to die and he teaches. No, John Coffey's the guy who like has the magic powers.

Poppy 39:50

Yeah. This is a different guy.

Skye 39:52

This is like the scrawny little white guy who, he's the guy who actually like that shithead, uh, guy who works there doesn't wet the sponge or whatever.

Poppy 40:02

Oh.

Skye 40:03

the one who gets the dry sponge on, on the electric chair. But he has a mouse named

Poppy 40:09

Mm. Edouard Delacroix.

Skye 40:10

who Delacroix. yes, that's him. Um, he has a mouse named Mr. Jingles. So I got a little rodent and I loved that movie and I was like, I'm gonna name my, my hamster Mr. Jingles. He's gonna go to the mouse circus. That's what he sounds like because he's from like Louisiana or whatever.

Poppy 40:29

Mm hmm.

Skye 40:30

Mr. Jingles was a black bear hamster. Very cute.

Poppy 40:35

Yeah.

Skye 40:36

He escaped from his cage a lot. Uh, we didn't, uh, As hamsters do we did not have him in a traditional hamster cage, you know The very colorful ones with like lots of little Grates in them and like tubes and whatnot. We had him in essentially an aquarium so we had like a glass aquarium where you know when you feed a fish and it's got like The part of the top that lifts up that you can put the fish food in He was able to climb up on top of his water bottle and like push You the thing, the lid up, and he escaped. He escaped frequently. This was not the cause of his demise. I feel in my heart of hearts that this little hamster wanted to be free so bad. He escaped so much. He hated his life being imprisoned. He wanted to be out. He wanted to be free. And I think that he was incredibly, incredibly intelligent. I also think that he took his own life.

River 41:36

I do remember you telling

Poppy 41:38

No.

Skye 41:39

So I found him one day my parents were they were partying downstairs. They had a bunch of friends over they're getting drunk They're getting turned. They're getting lit And I go to check on mr. Jingles He's still in his cage I pick him up. He's cold and i'm like what is going on? And I look in his mouth and there's a wood chip vertically in the back of his throat think that he intentionally ate a wood chip because he had food. He had water. He was trying to escape all the time I think that he intentionally suffocated himself to end his own life And I brought him downstairs. I was mortified. I was sobbing. I was crying I kind of had I kind of had an idea of what death was. I mean, I loved the green mile They're on death row in in that show, you know um movie rather, uh, so I go downstairs and And I'm crying, and I tell my parents, I'm like, I found Mr. Jingle's dead, and I'm holding his dead body in my hands. And all the adults around me begin laughing. They, they think it's funny that a child, a child's hamster died. Um, still why, looking back, I don't know. But they did, and they begrudgingly put him in a shoebox and buried him in the backyard. So that's my sort of,

River 43:00

Pretty bad reaction to a child in distress facing something's mortality.

Skye 43:06

Yeah,

River 43:07

the worst reaction

Skye 43:09

yeah.

Poppy 43:09

Yeah.

Skye 43:10

And I remember being very upset with them and being like, Why are you laughing? A life has been lost

River 43:17

Yeah. Mr. Jingles is fucking gone. You guys aren't getting it.

Skye 43:22

I don't know if it's because his name was silly. And they were like, And they were just like, Oh my god, Mr. Jingles is dead. Ha ha ha ha ha. And I'm just like, You don't understand. My friend who is in my bedroom and who sleeps in there with me, who I care for every single day. Yeah, so, You know, my grandfather died and I kind of sort of had this vague understanding of death and then my beloved hamster committed suicide. Yeah, so, my next question for you all, then, is, like, let's kind of move along in age. Now, speaking for the three of us, I know that we were all kind of angsty little tweens. We all went through like a rebellious, goth, emo sort of phase. Um, and like in goth, emo, angst, punk, whatever you want to call it, culture, death is kind of prevalent there, right? It's very, death pretty punk, death pretty punk rock. It's pretty cool. It's pretty edgy to know, become. an atheist or, you know, sort of have these

Poppy 44:33

metaphorically, without actually realizing what death truly encompasses

Skye 44:40

maybe when you're like a middle high schooler

River 44:42

of it all.

Skye 44:44

Yeah, maybe you get really into like poetry or like that sort of thing where you're you're starting to really think real deep about shit and you're starting to maybe question the religion that you're raised in and Death isn't necessarily front of mind, but it's sort of this poetic Rose tinted glasses thing that we're looking at So now I want you to kind of go back into your angsty preteen teenage when you thought that you knew it all, when you thought that you had it figured out, when you were learning about different things and you're like, fuck my parents, they were so wrong. I know the true answers to everything. What were, what were you thinking about death that point? Do you think that maybe you were avoiding death? Do you think that you were thinking about it too much?

Poppy 45:37

I think I thought I was invincible, honestly.

Skye 45:41

yeah.

Poppy 45:41

didn't think

River 45:42

that age, you're really. think it's never going to happen to you or anyone, you know,

Poppy 45:47

Mm hmm.

River 45:49

uh, I do have a story from middle school. I can share when I was deep emo, my emo teen days, I was listening to a lot of my chemical romance. I wasn't Catholic I was reading a lot of Edgar Allen Poe. You know how it is.

Poppy 46:05

Plath.

River 46:06

I never got into Sylvia Plath.

Poppy 46:08

Oh, no? Okay.

River 46:09

But I was in, I want to say seventh or eighth grade. I can't really remember one of the two. one night my brother's friend comes running up to our door. He's out of breath. He's exasperated. And he tells my mom and us that my brother's been in a terrible car accident.

Poppy 46:32

Oh my

River 46:33

yeah, it was a bad night. And he's in the hospital. It's really bad. long story short, he, his shit got real fucked up. He ended dying three times. He had to facial reconstruction surgery. He's got a big scar over his head from where they had to put his brain back together.

Poppy 46:55

Whoa.

River 46:56

Yeah So that, I was like conceptually like, uh, death and dying, uh, but then to have that be like, oh no, it can like, it can really be real for you and people, you know, will die. So there's that, which was very harrowing. His recollection of it, what he said happened, because he did die and get resuscitated three times. He said, It was like turning a TV off, and there was just nothing. And that's his truth, and that's his experience.

Poppy 47:33

hmm.

Skye 47:33

Yeah. Yeah. I think for me, it was very, because as you both know, still to this day, like I've never attended a funeral. It just has happened that way. No one close enough to me, like my grandfather dying, I was too young to go to that funeral and it was out of the country. So it just didn't make sense for me to go to that. since then, it just hasn't happened for me to go to a funeral. So don't that as a. really cognizant person. I haven't had that face to face, like, time to mourn someone close to me yet, which really fucking sucks in a way because I'm old enough now that when does hit me, it's gonna fucking rock my shit.

Poppy 48:13

Yeah.

Skye 48:14

But I adolescent stage, it was very much like a death was sort of this poetic thing where I was listening to these edgy lyrics and songs and it was sort of described in a way of like tangential love and sort of

Poppy 48:31

Mm hmm.

Skye 48:33

You know, I bleed for you, etc, etc

River 48:36

going to die.

Skye 48:38

Yeah, so it's it's like something that's being given offering like you're know, and I mean I didn't really trigger warning but like It was a tough time being a young adolescent with mental health issues and death kind of cr it wasn't Necess maybe suicidal ideation, but it wasn't for real for me if that makes sense But it it was ever present of like a feeling of like not wanting to be where I was and because I was poetically idolizing The concept of death. I think it danced in that territory for me But it I don't want to say too much without it being like super involved. Do you know what I mean? But I think the idea of death seemed romantic and promising and like an escape and like Something better than what it actually is, which it's not horrible

Poppy 49:42

without logically understanding the like, oh, that's it.

Skye 49:46

Yeah,

Poppy 49:47

can't come back from that. Yeah.

Skye 49:49

so it's kind of like, there's a weird tango with death, I think, when you're, when you're an edgy tween, know what I mean? Like, whether, whether you have those sort of ideations or not, I think that you kind of dip into the dark and you get this fascination with it, and that's why a lot of people do start reading horror genre and they start getting into Edgar Allen Poe and Stephen King and because it's just fascinating, um, the concept of that something so grotesque can also be beautiful and I think that that's sort of the age that that starts to blossom in young people.

Poppy 50:33

It's also just very other, and it's at least for young women. I feel like that's where the not like other girls territory really lies, where you're like, I'm, I'm not like everybody else. I like horror and darkness and death and, and whatnot. So it's

River 50:51

weird, I'm a girl.

Poppy 50:54

I'm weird.

Skye 50:57

Yeah, raise your hand if you've ever been a pick me.

Poppy 50:59

Yeah, absolutely.

Skye 51:02

it's part of, it's just a part of the metamorphosis, I think.

Poppy 51:05

Yeah, how you're socialized today because you're, I mean, when you're 14 years old and your entire life revolves around wanting other people to like you and wanting boys to like you and how do you do that? What do the, what do the romance movies tell us? Well, I have to eat pizzas and burgers and

River 51:25

I have to wear glasses and have brown hair.

Poppy 51:28

yeah, I like to not, yeah, I can't be blonde. I can't, like, the color pink, yeah, I have to be,

River 51:36

And what is the ultimate other if not death? What is the weird characteristic if not being really into death?

Poppy 51:43

yeah,

Skye 51:44

Yeah, there's got to be just something about her. There's something about her and I can't quite put my finger on it. She's so mysterious. I want to get to

River 51:52

like, as a depressed young woman, I can only speak for myself, I depressed teen girl at one point, like, there was something really comforting about the macabre and just like the despair that I was feeling internally, reading that other people were also feeling that.

Poppy 52:10

mm hmm, Also, for me, so, my, well, I've, I've had a, a fair amount of family members die when I was in middle school and high school, but the one that really stuck with me was, um, So she was a close family friend. She was also my mother's roommate for a couple of years. super vibrant, full of life, like, used to dress like a pirate and go to, like, pirate cons and host pirate parties and,

Skye 52:36

Hell,

River 52:37

cool as hell.

Poppy 52:38

She and her husband like built a pirate ship in their backyard, which used to be our old backyard. It's just, it's a long story, but, then she got ovarian cancer and it took a really long time, but she, she spent a really long time being really sick. Um, and then she died. And I, between the time that I knew her as like a vibrant, like very alive person, and the time where I was at her funeral, I didn't really see her very much, so I didn't see that, the change, or like any acceptance, um, or anything. She was just vibrant, full of color, then she wasn't, then she was dead. and being at her funeral she was so loved by the entire community, like she had a bunch of pirates, like pirate people show up at her funeral and like do readings and talk about how much they loved her and whatnot and that was just a very, it was very jarring for me because as a, as a teen girl, like we, like we're saying like associating the macabre and whatnot with this romantic. ideal, um, like a gothic kind of like Edgar Allan Poe, My Chemical Romance level, everything's kind of gray. But then applying that same lens over this person that I've known for years that was just full of light very jarring

River 54:02

It's like weird dissonance where you're like, that's not

Poppy 54:05

And it made it feel real.

Skye 54:07

Yeah, I think I think it's it when it when you think about it in this hypothetical sense of the poetry of the song Um in front of you and you yeah in

Poppy 54:17

roses.

Skye 54:18

you're like in concept. I love this thing, but then it becomes too personal all a sudden You when it

River 54:24

And it's not theatric, it's not beautiful. It's like very mundane a lot of the time.

Poppy 54:33

It, just exists. Yeah. It's very abrupt. Even when you're expecting it, it's still very abrupt, like acceptance of it, you know?

Skye 54:41

Yeah. Well, and that takes me into my next segment, probably the, well, maybe not the hardest segment, but jumping from adolescent teen years, we're all now 28, 29 years old. I want us to each go around and talk about our most recent, if we're comfortable with it.

River 55:00

I am comfortable But I'm

Skye 55:02

knew I was talking to you,

River 55:04

know. I'm

Skye 55:06

now, now that we've grown a bit and we are grown adults, And you know,

River 55:10

different now

Skye 55:12

more have happened. We have a little bit of a different lens. I, I, you know, we've taken the rose colored glasses off and we kind of have the realization and understanding of what implications death actually have on our lives and the lives people and how it creates an entire ripple effect into the entire universe when someone dies. What?

Poppy 55:30

do you want to go last? Because feel like we can't,

River 55:33

fine

Skye 55:35

can't, follow

River 55:35

a little too hot like well where do we go from fine I'm okay that

Skye 55:41

Do you want to first or do you want me to go first?

Poppy 55:43

can go first. I mean, it's not like, it's not, I mean, the most recent person that, um, died that I know, like, we were, was close to my heart. But I had not seen her for like a very long time. So it was another one of those things where you, there's also like a layer of guilt too. You know, like maybe you're, you feel like you haven't been a part of this person's life enough and then they're gone and then you have nothing. You feel like you could have done more, or you should have done more and you didn't, and there's no going back. Like you just, there's nothing after that. Right. and so there was a little bit of that, and also there's, so this was a family member and I think the hardest part isn't necessarily dealing, if you're not incredibly close to that person, at least for me, it wasn't dealing with with the death itself. It was seeing my family members kind of respond to that death and how it reshapes the family. when they're an integral, like, core part of that family and they have been for decades and decades and then they're gone. It's like, how does that change the structure of the family? Because it does and it, it becomes a scar on the family.

Skye 56:51

someone who's not ready has to step up perhaps.

Poppy 56:54

Yeah, like I, I mean, to be completely transparent, like my, the most recent death that I, dealt with was my maternal grandmother's twin sister, who was also like a grandmother to me and to my sister. So, just the, confronting the idea, that my grandmother, who is dead, in her 90s now. Like, she has had this twin sister that has literally been with her since birth for 90 years. Like, most of a century. And then she's just gone. One

Skye 57:23

they lived together, right? You said? They they were like inseparable, basically?

Poppy 57:27

Yeah, they spent their entire lives together. Um, and it was, I mean, when you're 90 nothing's really unexpected, right? But it was pretty abrupt. It happened over the course of a couple days. And then she was gone. it made me think a lot about eventually my sister when she dies or, or when I die and what that's going to do to her. and just really highlights the interconnectedness, I guess, because I feel like, especially when it comes to like the edgy component, like that romantic component, it's really easy to forget what impact that has on other people.

River 58:05

There's that separation of, oh the despair, oh the

Poppy 58:10

this is, it's all about me. It's very self centered. Yeah. Yeah. yeah, but then realizing the ripples it has in your community and, you know, it's just, yeah, so that, so that's my, that's my most recent experience.

Skye 58:23

I mean, we, as people, go about our lives, we don't just impact our immediate family, and immediate friends and family. Like, we go about our lives they're, like,

Poppy 58:33

Wedge Sally guy.

Skye 58:35

Wedge Salad guy! Oh my would you bring him

Poppy 58:40

I'm, I'm just, that's a perfect example though, Like he,

River 58:44

guy?

Poppy 58:45

Go ahead, Sky.

Skye 58:47

Poppy and I used to work at this restaurant. So these two guys used to come in all the time and they both would order a wedge salad. It was very specific. I feel like they got like dressing on the side, no bacon or something. Like it was very very specific and they ordered the exact same

Poppy 59:01

was thing And it was always them. The two

Skye 59:04

was always just the two of them. They would come in, they would sit at the same table every single week. They would come in regularly, like weekly. And then one time it was just one wedge salad guy. And we found out that the other w And that's how I don't know their name. They were just the wedge salad guys. that's what they ordered. But one of them died. And it was like, did you hear the wedge salad guy died? And it like touched everyone who worked there. And everyone knew, The wedge

Poppy 59:31

wedge salad guy. Yeah. And everybody, I mean, I remember people being really upset. Like, did you hear he had been, he had cancer? Apparently.

Skye 59:45

they were a real Laurel and Hardy, like, they were a duo. they were

Poppy 59:51

And then they weren't.

Skye 59:52

And then they weren't.

Poppy 59:53

Because nothing is permanent.

Skye 59:54

And I'm not like his niece, I'm not, I'm nobody. I was

River 59:57

just somebody that works at the restaurant

Poppy 1:00:00

But I will say that the restaurant that we worked at was an institution, in the, in the city that grew in, like it had been there for a long time, it had been basically exactly the same for a very long time. So. Any change, like, there were so many regulars, too, and any kind of alteration in that was really felt, like, bone deep throughout the community, so.

Skye 1:00:24

Yeah, so it's like even in our day to day lives we do things like go to restaurants If you're a regular at a restaurant you go to a grocery store Like you don't know who might miss you like a cashier at a restaurant

River 1:00:35

people recognize and remember you.

Skye 1:00:37

I don't know. It's just so crazy how I don't think that we really realize the way that we touch people's lives even if it's just one interaction. Because I even think about, I haven't gotten a haircut in quite a long time, and I'm like, I wonder if the guy who I used to go see every five weeks to cut my hair noticed. And I bet he did. I'm not dead, but I'm sure he noticed. I'm

Poppy 1:00:59

But gone, yeah.

Skye 1:01:00

he probably has a fleeting thought of like, haven't seen her in a while. And to get the news that someone who you interacted with semi regularly even has died, like, can hurt deeply.

Poppy 1:01:13

And for the living, what is death but an absence, right? Like, even, there are people that have been a part of our lives that We'll never see again and is that the same as death to us? Their absence in our lives?

Skye 1:01:26

But I feel like the potential to meet again is there. Without the like of

River 1:01:33

But they won't be the same person that they were, usually, generally, with

Skye 1:01:39

But least comfort

Poppy 1:01:42

Yeah.

Skye 1:01:42

Yeah, there's at least comfort in there that if we don't see them again, like a, say for

River 1:01:47

They're still there.

Skye 1:01:49

an old co worker friend that you used to work with, but like you didn't keep in touch, like, you probably won't see them again maybe, but like, The potential's you're in town, you're in a bar, maybe you'll run them. You're not going to be so distraught as opposed to you reading a Facebook post about the old co worker you used to work with who's dead now. Like that's way

Poppy 1:02:11

Which has happened, I feel, I mean, at least I know to the two of us, to Skye, that's happened before. I don't know about you, River, yeah.

River 1:02:19

to like high school classmates of mine.

Poppy 1:02:22

Lots of, mostly addiction and

River 1:02:25

Yeah.

Poppy 1:02:26

For at

River 1:02:27

Accidents.

Poppy 1:02:28

Yeah.

Skye 1:02:29

Yeah, I feel that's a pretty good segue into my most recent death. because the most recent death that I've had directly impact me it was a client of mine who had away and she had cancer. I mean, I was working closely with her because of her cancer. a part of my specialty at my job is that I work with people with cancer. Not everyone that we work with is qualified to work with cancer patients, but I'm one of the handful of people who do. she would come in and see me and I worked with her for like, two years and the way cancer goes it ebbs and flows ups and downs different treatments sometimes were better sometimes were worse and I mean towards the end she started talking about like I mean she said things like she went on a trip to like the beach or something and she was like I'm glad I got to see the beach one last time and I'm girl don't say things like that don't say things like that um and We were working for a while to, she wasn't able to have very long sessions because of the nature of cancer. You can't really get really long sessions. It has to be within a certain window. but because she had been off treatment for a little while, I was like, talk to your doctor to see, since you're not really on treatment, maybe we can get you, we can do you something real special. So she was able to talk to her doctor and get in contact with where we work and they made it happen for her that she could get extra time on her session finally after years of working with her. So I remember it was a Monday. I saw her on my books for that longer session and I was like, thank God we can finally have a nice little treat. well, I pulled up to work. looked at my books and saw that her name was no longer on my and I thought, damn, that sucks, cancer's crazy, sometimes you have a bad day and you need to cancel your appointment. I understand, that's happened before with us. I walk in, and the front desk is like, your client died yesterday. And I remember being so angry that the day before we finally get to do this thing, and I, I was thinking about this the other day, of like, how crazy is it that she probably thought about me the day that she died?

Poppy 1:04:40

Mhm.

Skye 1:04:40

Because when you have an appointment, even if she knew she was dying that day, she likely was like, I'm not gonna get to go to my appointment. Or, if she didn't know she was dying, she probably was looking forward to her appointment the next day. So knowing, in hindsight, that this woman, who I had grown a very close bond with, Who was going through something so incredibly difficult. And I was sort of a source of I was an appointment that she could look forward to. And that is such an honor. Especially in someone's, end of life. Like, it doesn't pass me that I was that for someone before they died.

Poppy 1:05:21

Mhm.

Skye 1:05:22

I was pissed off. And they ended up booking her spot. right afterwards and I was like crying in my room and I was so pissed off because I was like that's her time I got mad about like capitalism like for a minute because I I was like, this is a dead woman's slot. And also i'm also a person who like cares about her

Poppy 1:05:41

we just have a rest, please?

Skye 1:05:43

Yeah, i'm

Poppy 1:05:44

Like a moment of honor? Yeah.

Skye 1:05:46

like i'm not calling out like I don't need to call out for a day because she was Not I don't want to say just a client but i'm like it's not so distressing to me that I can't finish my day but I would like to give her time that she had scheduled to like have a moment of silence in my room or something for

Poppy 1:06:03

Mhm.

Skye 1:06:04

but I I was clocked in and I had to go back to work and it fucking sucked. was horrible. But um send her a bouquet of flowers her and her family. I sent her and her family a bouquet of flowers And I think about her all the time

River 1:06:18

And he also took up oil painting again in her honor to paint her something.

Skye 1:06:22

Thank you for reminding me that I did not paint the thing that I

River 1:06:26

You are going to paint You were

Skye 1:06:28

I did.

River 1:06:29

rounds

Skye 1:06:30

I doing

River 1:06:31

it to be as good as you could.

Skye 1:06:32

Yes. Yes. And one day, one day I will paint that thing for her. I was planning on painting her like a, a sunset beach scene because she was a very beachy woman. She loved the beach. Like I said, she said that she was glad that she could see the beach one last time. So I was going to do like a sunset beach painting in her honor, in oil paints. But yeah, I mean that was like, I don't know, six, nine months ago It was with, it was this year. It was, it was not that long ago.

Poppy 1:06:59

Mhm.

Skye 1:06:59

Yeah, so that fucking blew and Like I said, I, I haven't been to a funeral. I felt that it would be inappropriate If I looked too deep into going to her funeral. find her What's it called? Obituary online. did read her obituary Obituaries now online people can like comment and people were stories and stuff was reading stories about other people who were closer to her and everything that I read Seemed true to how I knew her. She was a wonderful wonderful woman. she rest in peace.

River 1:07:31

I'll drink to that.

Skye 1:07:33

Cheers

Poppy 1:07:34

to her.

Skye 1:07:35

So Yeah, I mean Sometimes it is like a close family loved one Sometimes it's just someone who breezes into your life in a way you didn't expect. And death impacts us all in different Like, sometimes you could have someone who's really close to you, and their death could not really impact you all too terribly much. And sometimes it can be someone like the Wedge Guy, or a of yours that you see every now and again, and then it hurts you deeply.

Poppy 1:08:03

Yeah.

Skye 1:08:04

is very, very strange.

River 1:08:06

very complicated, and it's an ongoing, lifelong process to learn to live whatever form it takes. It's hard for me not to like talk about it, thankfully, because it's been long enough between the death and now that I'm I'm mostly

Skye 1:08:24

been that long though.

River 1:08:26

It's been almost three years. Which is not actually a lot of time, but I can talk about it now. I used to not be able to talk about all,

Skye 1:08:35

You can be, you can be vague if you would like.

River 1:08:39

we'll see. We'll see where the takes me. It's just hard for me. Cause it was like so traumatic and abrupt that like chunks of my memory from that year are just gone. So I have a hard time like putting the timeline together. um, this is about my dad. My dad died and sort of similar to what we were talking about earlier. He wasn't really in my life a lot of the time for the past like 10 ish years. My parents went through a really nasty divorce. He did a lot of things that hurt me deeply that he never apologized for. And we never really Got our relationship back. But even when like he wasn't around in my life, I knew he was still there. he was still living in the world. And he was around somewhere even if we weren't talking. in February of 2022, he did suicide. And it was a big ol shock to the family. It took, cause he didn't immediately die. He was in a coma on life support for about 24 hours. So it was that weird, like, He's not dead, but he's not here. And we don't know if he's going to die or if he's going to come back from this. that did a number on my brain and my family and our interpersonal dynamic, cause my parents had remarried each other at the time they had been remarried to each other for like three or four years up till that point. Um the memory chunks, I'm trying to sift through over here. It's a chunky and there are just some big gaps in there. But, Oh, it, it rocked my shit for like a really long time in a way that I didn't expect. Cause I All the time I would be like, yeah, my dad's not in my life. Like we're not really close. He's he's there, but we don't speak. He's married to my mom again, but that's kind of all I never even really called him my dad at the end. I would always just call him his first name. And I, the last time I saw him was Christmas day of 2021

Poppy 1:10:58

Hard

River 1:10:59

hard time, especially hard time now.

Poppy 1:11:03

Yeah.

River 1:11:04

But we didn't, we still didn't really speak. And there's that weird guilt of like, I should have tried harder. should have done more. It's that classic grief. Like what could I have done to it? Especially when it comes to suicide, you're like, I could have done something to stop this, to prevent this, which is not true. you can't take

Skye 1:11:25

actually don't think, like with someone Who's in that sort of state. I think, a child especially, I don't know if there is anything that you

River 1:11:36

well I also a child at the end. I

Skye 1:11:38

But you're, you

River 1:11:40

year old

Poppy 1:11:41

Their child. That relationship

Skye 1:11:45

I, I, don't, I don't know. It's just so tricky because it's nuanced.

River 1:11:48

And there were other facts. It wasn't just like he and my relationship, like his sister had just died and he was guilt from that. And he and my mom were having like marital troubles once again. So it was, and he had just retired from work. So he like, wasn't doing anything outside of the house. He didn't have any hobbies and he went cold turkey off of his antidepressants. So it was like, A hundred things building up together, so like nothing I solely could have done would have prevented it. I got real fucked up for a really long time over it, understandably so. And I like curled inward on myself, my family's in shambles. We're all trying to figure how to cope and process and move forward with this terrible traumatic event that's happened. And I went back to therapy cause I'd been in therapy for a really long time, was the best move I could have made.

Poppy 1:12:46

you

River 1:12:47

yeah, I emailed my therapist and I didn't say anything specifically. I was like, Hey, girl, you got any time coming I can just like slide on in there cause

Poppy 1:12:56

Good for you for care of yourself though. That's, that's

River 1:13:00

know else to do. And I was like, I need somebody more qualified to like help me navigate this. Yeah.

Poppy 1:13:07

Well, you reached out, you could just curled up into a little rolly ply

River 1:13:11

that's the thing. I, I watched Hoarders a lot growing up as a child. And so many people on that show have experienced, like, traumatic, sudden loss. And they were never able cope and move forward. And that's led them to, like, Really bad living situations and like stuck in their misery and not to be extreme. I was like, oh my god I'm gonna be on hoarders, but I I don't want to be somebody that is just like Consumed and overwhelmed by this like grief and trauma that I don't have a life for myself anymore So I got to outsource some help on this

Poppy 1:13:47

You asked for help? Yeah.

River 1:13:48

Yeah, which is the best thing you can do. And my therapist did put me in contact with a grief group. It's like a communal support group for other people specifically for like suicide loss, which was really helpful. Cause I would talk to other people and I wouldn't be like, super candid about it. I'd be like, oh, yeah, my dad died and I would leave the biggest bits of it and they'd be like, Oh, yeah, my grandpa had a heart attack. I know exactly what that feels like and I had to like fight the urge to grab their shoulders and be like, you don't know what this Shut up. thankfully like I've grown and I've healed from it. to an extent. But it's it's fucked and it's tricky and it's hard and it's not I thought I would you know, i'd be in my grief for a set amount of time And then I wouldn't be like a set end where i'd be like i'm not grieving anymore This rocks. I don't have to grieve anymore And that's not true. I'm gonna be grieving for the rest of my life. It's just gonna look and feel different

Poppy 1:14:53

It's an absence.

River 1:14:54

Yeah, it's an absence, even though he wasn't in my life, it still rocked me to my core and I had to figure out how to live when my dad was dead. And it's sucks and it's tricky, but it gets easier. The more you learn how to navigate it and you can manage it. And I still have days where I get real in my feels about it and I still feel guilty and I still feel bad, but they come less and less and they're less intense. And I just, I get to live with that for the rest of my life as we all do.

Poppy 1:15:26

Yeah.

Skye 1:15:27

I get what

River 1:15:29

Everybody dies, no matter what their relation or their impact on your life or their influence. They're gonna be one

Skye 1:15:38

I get really worried because I feel so lucky, at least currently, in my life right now where I have so many people around me that I, I feel like I have a very good support system and I love, I have a very select amount of people that I love extremely, extremely deeply. It's not like an obligatory love that I felt more so growing up where it's like, we're your family, you gotta love Like, I, yeah, like I have a chosen family and I also have select people from my actual family who I also love very deeply, and kind of like, picked apart and, you know, not gotten rid of, but distanced myself from the

River 1:16:14

You've refined it.

Skye 1:16:16

yeah, I don't necessarily align with very much, and pretty much my day to day contact is with people who I feel extremely, extremely deeply for, and the knowledge that All of us will die one day is just kind like a Like thinking about like the order of operations in which that will happen is very distressing to me

River 1:16:35

think about it all the time with my siblings. Like, I four And I'm like, oh my god, these people I've known my entire life, like, most of them are probably gonna die before I am and I have to live with that too now.

Poppy 1:16:49

That's like when you're asked to be. Like, my sister asked me to be the godmother for her kids, which made me think like, oh, you're asking me this because of the potential that you and my brother in law might day just in case, because it's, it's a real possibility that, you know, who knows,

Skye 1:17:08

Yeah, michael

Poppy 1:17:10

are

Skye 1:17:10

ago um, I it might have been at thanksgiving honestly, but it's that idea. It's not like super serious or in motion but that idea of Now that we're married, it's like, should we form a will?

Poppy 1:17:22

You should. You should form a living will, absolutely.

Skye 1:17:25

So it's just those things that, and I think even when you form a will, especially when you're younger, like us, that it's again, that sort of hypothetical situation. You're not really, it's not like we're in our sixties forming a will of like, well, you know, we're going to die and you guys are our

River 1:17:41

getting to be

Skye 1:17:42

the house yeah.

Poppy 1:17:44

can happen. I mean, even, a will can even protect you while you're alive. If, if one of you is in a car accident and you go into a coma, you that will will be your protection against something you don't want to happen happening.

Skye 1:17:57

yeah. Well, I guess I'll roll into my last little bit now. Now that we've had all these experiences that we're talking about. I mean, obviously just being a human, we have experience with death. We learn about what death is, we see it, we experience it firsthand. and at least us three individuals chose to work with death gods, knowing the experiences that we've had. We all chose to work with death gods, correct me if I'm wrong, after most of these experiences have already occurred. what do you feel like is sort of your current stance on death in the lens of working with a death god. After you've worked with your death gods and with all the experiences that you have experienced, where do you sort of stand? You don't have to get too deep into it if you don't want to, but with your experience of being a human and also as a practitioner with a death god, where do you sort of lie? Do you feel like working with a death god has you feel like opened you up in certain ways. Do you feel like maybe you're more comfortable with death, relating to your own mortality or that of others?

River 1:19:09

a that's a meaty

Skye 1:19:11

I'm sorry.

Poppy 1:19:11

That's a

River 1:19:13

really big one.

Poppy 1:19:14

Yeah so say,

Skye 1:19:16

just going to say it's the only way that I can think to round this out.

Poppy 1:19:19

Yeah. will say I, for at least the past, like, four or five years, I feel like intellectualized death a lot because I, I do annual reading challenges and every year I have the goal to read at least one book on either grief or death and dying. Uh, so I've been doing that for years now, before, like, years and years before I started working with a death god, which has helped me kind of intellectualize death and, like, accept. the realities of death and dying, like physically the impacts on, you know, the body and like the rest of the world and the people around you, etc, etc. however, working one on one with death god, specifically Hades, because to me Hades represents that. void, like the empty space that everything returns to, has been very comforting for it's kind of more materially, you know, cause like, I, the concept of death and like, x. I have acceptance of that but materially, like, spiritually

River 1:20:24

it yourself is different.

Poppy 1:20:26

still scary, right? like, for me, the acceptance of that void, like the empty space, has been very, very comforting. And I, that's really all that I can say at this point in time. Just knowing that it's. It is there, it has always existed, it will always exist, and I'm just a little, a little itty bitty part of that, inconsequential part of that.

Skye 1:20:48

Counter question. What are your thoughts on the afterlife?

Poppy 1:20:51

Just generally.

Skye 1:20:52

For you, for you, if you were to die today and in your last moments you're about to take your last breath, what, what do you, what do you, would you shoot out a prayer just like a last Hail Mary? Like, do you believe in heaven? Do you think it's a reincarnation situation? Do you think it's nothing? Do you think you go into the everything and come, you know, like, what, what are, what are you

Poppy 1:21:11

I think that as a human, it's impossible to know, and I also think that as a human, humanity has put their own spin on things in a very human way. because the way that we experience life is incredibly different from how 99. 99999%, percent of things that are alive today have experienced life. And so we, Put this, like, veil, this lens over it that is very uniquely human, and there's that question, like, Are humans special? Are we the only ones that really get an afterlife? Because we're evolved, we're a higher level of being, like, we're conscious, etc., etc. and to me, that's just a, there's a big question mark there. So, it's very, It's just unknown. And that's also, like, what that void, what Hades represents for me. So I think, back to your question, if I were to die, if I knew, like, five minutes from now I'm about to die, I think that I would spend that time, not sitting at a prayer, but more reflecting and, like, practicing gratitude for this experience that I have had on this planet, on this Earth, for the past 28 years. And what a gift that is, like in the less than, a fraction of a blink in the span of time, um, that the universe has been expanding from that central point, you know?

Skye 1:22:28

Do you think Do you that, you would not be able to help but in those last minutes think about your regrets? Or do you think that you would really try to fight that urge into gratitude?

Poppy 1:22:40

I think it depends on the day, honestly. Day to day, I mean, you know, ask me on Thursday, I'm a completely different person on Thursday than I am on Sunday, right? But,

Skye 1:22:49

Thursday.

Poppy 1:22:50

yeah. I think, I mean, in this moment right now, I think that I have, I mean, the only I the avenues that I have not been able to explore because there are infinite pathways that I could have explored on, like, in my time on this planet.

Skye 1:23:09

Regrets future rather than the past?

Poppy 1:23:11

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, like what, what could have been. But I'm still incredibly happy with what I have now and like what I have experienced. So.

Skye 1:23:21

That's beautiful.

Poppy 1:23:22

Yeah

Skye 1:23:24

River, now you do it.

River 1:23:25

I think I'm largely in a similar vein with Poppy. Where I'm going to. Let me Give to collect my thoughts. know have alexithymia. It's hard for me to get coherent thoughts out.

Poppy 1:23:42

what is that? I've never heard of that

River 1:23:44

it's an autism trait where I have a hard time conceptualizing my thoughts and my feelings into So it takes me a minute to get somewhere sometimes.

Poppy 1:23:55

I'd just be

River 1:23:58

makes sense to anybody else. God knows where it's But, I would say, I used to be really terrified of death and the fact that I'm going to die someday and that I don't know what's going to go on when I die and it's completely out of my hands and out of my control. And thankfully now, with everything that's happened in my life and my choices and lived experiences and my spiritual practice, seems less daunting and less complete and absolute as it used to be. In a way that I'm still, I'm still trying to parse out. I do see it as more of a transformation than like an abrupt end to everything. And I, I don't know what's going to happen when I die. I don't know if I'm going to get reincarnated. I don't know if there is a heaven I will go to. I don't know if I'm just going to be in the big cosmic soup and back as drops of rain.

Poppy 1:24:59

Let me come back as a fungus, please.

River 1:25:01

please let me come back. Please. But, and it's one of those things I won't know until it happens.

Poppy 1:25:09

not know when it happens

River 1:25:10

And I might know when it happens. If I've already died and come back as this little freak you see before you, I don't remember it. So I, I just don't know. And I try to, like Poppy, just be grateful for the life that I have and the, the people in my life that I love and care about. It's not always easy. I'm not always good at it. Look those 10 fingers. That's

Poppy 1:25:33

have I have 10 fingers my hands. I can to pick things up. I can use them to pick flowers and smell them. I can use them a little sip of

River 1:25:44

the sun on my shoulders I get to talk to my friends and that's what life is about.

Poppy 1:25:50

I get to hug people that love me.

River 1:25:52

Yeah. And they give good hugs.

Poppy 1:25:55

I get to think about fucking fungus and how crazy that shit is. I've been reading a book about fungus, like, very front of mind for me right now.

River 1:26:05

But in a, in a roundabout way, I don't know what's going to happen. And I feel differently about death now. I still think it's going to be very scary when I am actually dying myself. Cause I had a kidney stone earlier this year and I thought I had and thought I was dying and it very scary.

Skye 1:26:24

What about, you haven't really touched on the death god aspect. How do you feel, how has changed anything for you? How, that?

River 1:26:34

like, it's, it's a transformation and Dionysus is the god of transformation. So it's not how you say, It's not concrete, it's very fluid and very elusive and there's that mystery and that ambiguity and just because something doesn't look or seem or feel the way it used to be does not mean it's not there anymore, it's just different now.

Poppy 1:26:59

I will also say, I I feel like we haven't really touched on this at all, but feel like a lot of people don't I mean, at least in pop culture, don't see Dionysus as a death god.

River 1:27:09

No, he is, um, the drinking wine partying

Poppy 1:27:13

Yeah, mm hmm,

River 1:27:15

But he is, he's a death god. He's a god of

Poppy 1:27:18

mm hmm.

River 1:27:19

I certainly didn't know that at the time looking into him, and I was oh shit. Oh crazy. Yeah So and a big part of my spiritual practice a lot of messages I've been getting recently from a lot of different avenues are about like surrender and letting go control that i'm Always desperately clinging to because i'm a human being and i'm terrified of being a human being and the things that happen to human beings And death is the ultimate surrender. It's the ultimate can't control

Skye 1:27:51

it's not necessarily, I don't want to speak for everyone, but in general, I feel like it's not death that we're afraid of, but pain rather.

Poppy 1:27:59

yeah,

Skye 1:27:59

like you dying aspect is scary. it's the experiencing

River 1:28:03

because there are really horrific ways to die, and I don't want to die horrifically. I want for but I don't want to suffer,

Poppy 1:28:13

being raised as a Catholic and thinking about that internal damnation aspect, like thing that's been drilled into our minds that when you die, if you are not, you if you're not perfect, like if you don't repent,

River 1:28:25

when you're on your way home and you know your parent is pissed off at you know they're gonna fucking yell at you second you walk through the front door. It's that car ride is dying and you're like, I'm gonna get fucking yelled at the second

Poppy 1:28:38

For the rest of eternity.

River 1:28:40

eternity.

Poppy 1:28:42

So Skye, I do have a question. So, in the past you have commented on how you, you're pretty confident that you're gonna live to like 90, like 100, like you're gonna live a long time. Do you feel like that confidence in the longevity of your life has affected your memento mori of viewpoint?

Skye 1:29:01

I do. I, I mean, I feel like that sort of mentality of least having the confidence that I have a long life to live makes me not feel so rushed achieve perfection early. If that makes sense. Now, of course I'm not perfect with this. Of course I compare myself to others

River 1:29:20

You're not perfect in your quest for perfection? That's crazy.

Skye 1:29:24

Yeah. Of course I compare myself to others in, of the same age as me and milestones and what have you. And society raises me to expect X, Y, Z by a certain point. But if I zoom out a little bit and it's like, babe, you're going to live to a hundred years old and you are not even 30 years old. Like the things that you desire and want in your life, there is time to do that. And now that

Poppy 1:29:49

like, sorry go ahead,

Skye 1:29:50

I was just gonna say, that doesn't mean you can just sit on your ass for another decade and do

Poppy 1:29:55

that's what I was gonna ask, like do you feel like that means you're, you're just delaying thinking about the end

River 1:30:01

line between it's all gonna work out, you don't have to stress about it, but you do have to work.

Poppy 1:30:07

Yeah, you still have shit to do, yeah, mm

Skye 1:30:09

it's just sort of a, cushion of comfort, if that Because obviously, when you get towards the end of life, once you start reaching late 60s, early 70s, like 70 to 100, you, you're not as, Typically speaking, you're not as able to do a lot of the things as you can earlier in life, when you're in your late teens to fifties and sixties per se, especially with your physical body. Like, you may be less able bodied, for example. So it's within reason, I have to live my day to day life from and retire, and all that bullshit. But my wants and desires, like if I want to Like, we can circle back to the oil painting thing. It's like, that's of something that I can refine for decades and decades and decades, and I don't really need to put that as front of mind right now, because that's just a want of mine. Like, I

Poppy 1:31:03

You to be like putting in three hours every single night like working on your oil painting skills.

Skye 1:31:08

Exactly. So it's just little things like that. It's a little bit of a comfort to me, having that confidence, knowing that I have time to do things like that. But more important things, it's like, maybe, you know, put a fire under your ass and get moving, girl. Like, you can't just lay around and be a couch potato think you're gonna live be a hundred.

River 1:31:28

Yeah.

Skye 1:31:29

Yeah.

Poppy 1:31:29

And what about your um, what about the Morgan? What role does she play in all of this?

Skye 1:31:33

role doesn't she play She's the one putting the fire under my ass. She She, because of the whole self sovereignty thing, I feel like in regards to death, she's very much a reminder to me of like, What she says to me is, in very general terms, is, What do you want? then I her what I want. And then, kind of morbidly, she's like, Well, Get to it.

Poppy 1:32:04

Mhm

Skye 1:32:05

is the life you have. This is the time you have. Why do you feel like you can spend your time wasting it? Like, why are you not, not that I, you need to cherish every single moment, but it's like, if you were able to do this thing, if you were able to enjoy this thing, and this is what you want in life, truly what are you doing to attain that? And, and sometimes I don't have a very good excuse.

Poppy 1:32:28

But also I feel like you've in the past said this is not your soul's first time around sun, right? So like,

Skye 1:32:35

that doesn't mean get to waste it.

Poppy 1:32:37

no, no, of course not, of course not, but like, do you feel like you've worked with her before in past lives? do you feel like

Skye 1:32:43

I don't know.

Poppy 1:32:44

you're just, that's, I mean, I guess if, if you're not in that life anymore, like, that's none concern

River 1:32:50

now, baby.

Skye 1:32:51

yeah, I feel of that whole aspect of it, of it being like, being a quote unquote wiser soul is sort of like, because you have so much wisdom from past lives, this is sort of the

Poppy 1:33:04

No excuses.

Skye 1:33:05

Like really like you and because of the way that my life So far has been set up in the position that I am in right now I really could go anywhere. I truly am in like in a pretty privileged position right now That if I were to put my mind on something like I could do it and I think that that's because of all of the reincarnations in past lives of Whatever suffering and hardships and wisdom that I had to learn then To be in the place that I am in right now and now After I don't know centuries and centuries thousands of lives And now a deity has come to me and being like well You've put in all this work lifetime after lifetime including this lifetime right now the opportunity What do you want? And that's a big fucking question

Poppy 1:33:54

hmm.

Skye 1:33:54

And it's a lot of pressure

Poppy 1:33:56

Yeah. to be on social media? don't

River 1:34:03

for three hours on your couch? it feel good for your

Skye 1:34:07

I thought you meant like me be on social media. I going to be like, well, we have this podcast, but do I want to be sitting? Do I want to be? Yeah.

Poppy 1:34:16

media.

Skye 1:34:17

No. Do I want to be doom scrolling on my couch for hours on end? No. Do I

River 1:34:22

wanna be loving, I wanna be living. And alright bitch, what are you doing then?

Skye 1:34:27

Yeah

River 1:34:27

For me anyway, that's just me at myself right there.

Skye 1:34:31

No, subscribe to that, unfortunately. But, blanket wise, I feel like to answer my own question, I I loosely subscribe to The concept of How you say A collective consciousness, call it God, call it the universe, whatever you want. That whole philosophy of it playing hide and go seek, and we're all God, wearing a

Poppy 1:34:56

Like the egg.

Skye 1:34:58

Yes, the egg theory. Very much like that. That's kind of my loose, it's not my hard and set theory.

Poppy 1:35:05

Mm hmm.

Skye 1:35:05

thing, but I, you know, it's sort of like God is within all of us and, you know, the, the bodies we're in is the mask we wear. It's the ego that's the mask and et cetera, et cetera. But

River 1:35:17

for the divine to move throughout the world.

Skye 1:35:20

yes. And it's sort of our job to recognize the divine within us. And then when we pass on, we reconnect with that same divine. And because of that. I sort of believe that, not literally I do believe that all religions are true. because the way religion evolves over time, they all sort of play off of one another, they're just sort of iterations and evolutions of each other.

Poppy 1:35:48

Like Scientology.

Skye 1:35:49

I don't know enough about Scientology. I,

Poppy 1:35:52

You mean like the major religions are

Skye 1:35:54

Yes

Poppy 1:35:55

So like, Islam, Judaism, Christianity, Buddhism, Taoism, Hinduism,

Skye 1:36:03

sure yes, and I

Poppy 1:36:05

ones.

Skye 1:36:06

yeah, and I also feel like dying day like I asked you guys. I didn't get an answer from River actually I think about that but

River 1:36:14

Huh

Skye 1:36:15

What you would believe in your dying like breath or whatever we could circle back to that like but I think that if you believe that you're gonna go to heaven, or if you believe that there is nothing, that kind of is what will happen to you. Cause if there is a collective consciousness, and I don't really know how I feel about your consciousness versus your soul versus your body, like, obviously I believe your body decays and doesn't really matter. But the consciousness versus the soul thing, I haven't decided if they're one and the same or if they're two separate. but I would like to think that if you believed in heaven, the collective conscious would allow you to experience that once you passed on. If that makes sense. Because, I mean, I believe in ghosts, Like, their souls are kind of still lingering. I believe that a ghost loosely is just a soul that has not yet connected back to the greater collective consciousness. But it's all very, very loose. It's just a web of energy at the end of the day. That we assign a meaning to ourselves and other people.

Poppy 1:37:23

hmm.

Skye 1:37:25

I, you know, it, it is all just a transmutation, just transformation, exchange of energy, energy can't be created or destroyed. It's, it's all that.

Poppy 1:37:34

And then there's the, there's the stuff that's not energy or matter, and that's, What we don't understand, within the space that's not the space,

Skye 1:37:43

Like antimatter.

Poppy 1:37:45

not even necessarily antimatter, but yes.

Skye 1:37:48

Yeah. So I, obviously there is stuff that we don't understand and I don't think that we need to understand it. I think that at the end of the day, if it brings you comfort. in this lifetime, before you die. As long as you're not hurting anyone, obviously. As long as your beliefs don't impose on other people. if in your dying breath you believe you're gonna go to heaven, if in your dying breath you believe that you're just gonna become dust and nothing and never come back, if that's what brings you comfort, then I think that that's what's gonna be true for you.

River 1:38:19

Yeah I mean that's my answer. You said it

Skye 1:38:22

what's true for me? What do I think is going to happen in my last dying breath?

River 1:38:25

want to happen in your dying breath? What does your crave?

Skye 1:38:30

we kind of mentioned, but didn't really mention, but it's like the whole, you don't remember what happened before you were born.

Poppy 1:38:36

Yeah.

Skye 1:38:37

I think that's going to happen again. Cause obviously I came here, I'm here right now. Something happened. I got here. Something happened before I was born. So, I feel like there's like, sort of a way cooler, more mystical version of like a control panel.

Poppy 1:38:55

Mm

Skye 1:38:55

Like you'll kinda, you'll get shifted in.

River 1:38:58

doing your create a sim menu.

Skye 1:39:01

Uh, I think that there's like pre allocated files that you have to choose from, or you just get handed a file and then you go down. I don't know if you necessarily get to choose everything. you might get to choose, like, a vague path. Like, you might get to choose, like, a purpose or something. Like, I don't think that you get to be like, those posts who are like, you choose your parents or whatever. I don't think that that's true necessarily. Um, I don't think that, cause I think it's too nebulous when you're up there. And if they're like, yeah, you get to go to Earth for maybe X amount of years, you get to be I don't even know if you'd get to choose your body, per se.

Poppy 1:39:37

Yeah. I personally feel like there's no choice whatsoever, because there, I mean, consciousness is rare. You know? And if all life is, like, encompassed within The greater life than all life does not think in a conscious way. So there's no room for choice.

Skye 1:39:55

But you might, I do not think that there might be room to have the choice to become something unconscious.

Poppy 1:40:04

I think that we are by, by very lucky happenstance conscious.

Skye 1:40:08

think we're an enigma. That we're not

Poppy 1:40:11

I think we are incredibly incredible. Not that we're not supposed to be conscious. I think that we are conscious. And it's just very rare to be conscious because

River 1:40:20

are

Poppy 1:40:21

the, the vast, vast majority of things are not, they're alive.

Skye 1:40:25

But do you believe that the universe as a whole and life is conscious?

Poppy 1:40:30

No.

Skye 1:40:32

Fascinating.

River 1:40:33

just more a force of nature

Poppy 1:40:35

I think that it is, I think that it exists and that it is, but I don't think that it is choosing to be.

Skye 1:40:41

Now, yes, I guess I don't I don't think that Life, God, universe, source, whatever have you. I don't think that it has opinions. I don't think that it has emotions. I don't human-like

Poppy 1:40:56

Mm hmm. But you think it follows rules?

Skye 1:40:59

I think that it has an intelligence,

Poppy 1:41:01

Ah.

Skye 1:41:02

um, and perhaps rules because of physics and like how we discussed that, that the universe does follow a sort of order and sort of law.

Poppy 1:41:12

think rules but not intelligence. That's my perspective.

Skye 1:41:16

it has both. I would like to think that it has both. Um, but not feeling. I don't think that it has humility or sympathy or empathy necessarily. Um, it might, but not necessarily. I think that it, it's got an order and a structure and I, way that humanity came to be, like, we are so flawed and so strange and so distinct that we have these human like qualities that we sort of separate from nature to say things like, well, this is man made, this is not natural. When in reality, we are animals, we are man, but we are part of nature and thus, in a way, we are natural. We are, the universe created us to be this way. And so we are this way. And so everything that is quote unquote man made is, I don't want to say it's all natural, but you know what I mean? Like, big picture, big picture, like, the intelligence of humanity is natural.

Poppy 1:42:13

but then you go back and the only reason that we are in existence right now is because 66 million years ago an asteroid hit at the exact perfect angle in order to kill the dinosaurs which created an avenue for mammals to rise which then primates and humanity etc etc so it's like is that did something did something throw the asteroid at us and why earth and why here and now and us and mammals and where else and who else and what else and when else

Skye 1:42:41

I

Poppy 1:42:42

and

Skye 1:42:44

like I said, I don't think that we're like, special. I don't think that humans are like, I don't know if the universe went out of its way to be like, I'm gonna make humans. But I think that it must be happening all over, all over the whole entire universe, everywhere. Asteroids hitting,

Poppy 1:43:03

it has somewhere.

Skye 1:43:05

asteroids hitting planets and creating beings that eventually have sentience, like it's just, just

Poppy 1:43:11

mammalian, but yeah.

Skye 1:43:13

well, no, I mean, I don't know what elements or whatever on other planets far, far, far away. But it's just like this innate feeling and emotion and intelligence. It may not be exactly the same as human, but it just feels like it must be an intention of the universe. It must be a reflection of life and the pulse of life to create what we are. Because we can't just be an accident. We are an evolution of what nature has already presented. If that makes sense. Like, we're not like some bastardization of like, yeah, we're killing the planet or whatever. Like, that fucking sucks. We're stupid. But,

Poppy 1:43:54

I, I

River 1:43:55

are bastards, but we're not a bastardization. Sky,

Poppy 1:43:59

I think we are one, one inevitability of the infinite paths

Skye 1:44:05

Yes.

Poppy 1:44:05

time could have, you know, hurtled down.

Skye 1:44:09

Yeah, don't know. It's just like a, we, we must because we do. Like, it, I feel like it's just an eventuality

Poppy 1:44:16

Yeah

Skye 1:44:17

Like, somewhere in the universe, like, there has to be every expression of life, because it

River 1:44:24

you read Galapagos by Kurt Vonnegut?

Skye 1:44:27

No.

River 1:44:28

like you would love Galapagos by Kurt Vonnegut.

Skye 1:44:30

And I didn't give this any forethought before talking today. just speaking out of my ass currently.

Poppy 1:44:35

I have a lot thoughts on that we can talk about later, but.

Skye 1:44:38

I'm just an ignorant person thinking about spirituality and zooming out way too far.

Poppy 1:44:42

Yeah, I'm, I'm just a person thinking from like an evolutionary standpoint, also zooming out way too far, so

River 1:44:48

I'm just somebody that's enjoying the conversation I'm

Poppy 1:44:50

And you're just hanging out.

River 1:44:53

beautiful women speak to each other and

Skye 1:44:55

afraid that I sound like a fucking idiot because I be surprised if I do.

Poppy 1:45:00

There are, there are hundreds of thousands of people that have your exact viewpoint

Skye 1:45:05

I can't even say like, if tomorrow, like this episode airs, I might listen to it and be like, I actually don't a hundred percent agree with that anymore.

Poppy 1:45:11

You're gonna be different tomorrow. It's Sunday, baby. Thursday us is so far away. well. Everybody, thank you for listening. Hopefully you're still here. if you would like to send us your thoughts on the after the beyond, the then and the now, you can email us at death coven pod@gmail.com. That is death as in death, coven as in Coven Pod in podcast@gmail.com. And we also have an Instagram that you can go and follow and message us and like all of our pictures and, you know, whatever it is you want to do. And you can do that at deathcovenpod. Um, yeah. Please email us. Please, please send us a little ditty. Please diddle us.

River 1:46:00

I don't know if you can do that through email.

Poppy 1:46:03

can do a lot of The internet is, an incredible place.

River 1:46:07

gone too far.

Poppy 1:46:08

Yeah, Well, thank you. Hopefully this wasn't too depressing. you know that, you're like on a stage and someone comes out with like the hook and they

River 1:46:17

The cane. have those rotten ready to throw at you.

Skye 1:46:24

Someone behind the curtains yelling, by the power of three, get it over

Poppy 1:46:27

Oh yeah, by the power of three!

Skye 1:46:30

And so it is.

River 1:46:31

it is.

Poppy 1:46:32

So it is. go.

River 1:46:36

Let's fucking go.

Poppy 1:46:37

doing the rest of the day?

River 1:46:40

I'm gonna watch The Sopranos and I'm gonna knit a baby blanket. I'm also gonna brush my teeth for the first time today,

Poppy 1:46:46

Oh, thank god, you stink!