DABDA: those 5 stages of grief

DABDA: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. We don't necessarily go through them in order, nor do we necessarily all go through all of them. Sometimes we get stuck. Elizabeth Kubler-Ross introduced these stages to us back in 1969 in her book On Death and Dying. I read the book back in the 70s when a friend my age was dying of leukemia and Kubler-Ross came to interview her. And now here I am experiencing the stages of grief (well one stage: anger) because my 94 year-old Mom has died.
I'm stuck like a moose in the spring thaw. I know it has been only 11 days, but my blood is boiling. Every communication I attempt with my sibling just makes my anger worse. She feels unable to speak with me, and I now feel unable to email her. I cannot go out to Missouri for the memorial service that they were not going to have, and now are having this weekend. I was not invited, but now am invited to write something that someone else could read (not my sister). I cannot. Mom always said when you don't know what to do, do nothing. At the moment, that is all I can do: nothing. And it feels wrong. I stand for peace, and today I am a hypocrite. I cannot make peace with my family.
Maybe tomorrow I will be able to move forward.

Knowledge is Power, redux

Just coming off a migraine again. But no headache today. Today I want to think again about the universe, about spiritually, about connectedness and what we really know. On June 15 I was musing about these things whilst in the throes of a migraine. I didn't come up with answers about why I believed in reincarnation, but not necessarily in a higher power. I haven't found the answers yet. I don't know whether I believe in karma, though I would like to. It would be satisfying to believe that somehow, somewhere people who perpetuate evil in this world will be repaid. But they might not. And if I believe that, does that mean that people who are now suffering horrible lives are paying for past or future deeds? Or is it all random?
There are millions of people starving to death in another part of the world -- right now, this minute -- while grapes in my garden are falling to the ground and rotting. While people are throwing food away because they're too lazy to eat leftovers, because restaurants give out too large servings, because we buy too much and don't eat it. I can't ship those grapes anywhere, they aren't even "food grade" grapes. I eat some of them, the ones I can reach and pick over. I try not to waste food at my house, and I know I am in the minority. I also know that I do this because I am scraping by financially.
There are millions of people starving to death and we knew the famines were coming, we know about it every day, we know we could end it, and we do nothing much. We could end the famines easily by cutting back on war. Just us, the US. We could. Imagine if all the nations worked together to end the famines. We could continue on with the wars and still end hunger.
If nations worked together, we could end war. End hunger. End disease. End global warming. If we worked together, there is no end to the good we could create. Knowledge of that is more than power, it is heartbreak. Because for some reason, we don't want to work together. We don't want peace. We seem to prefer fighting, conflict, war. Where is the love, the peace, the understanding?