Monday brought with it a bit of anxiety. The kids and I, together with Charlie and KK, were meeting with Monsignor and then we were going to the funeral home to say our private goodbyes. I was fairly certain that the chat with Monsignor would go smoothly. The obituary was written and had appeared in the Saturday paper. Our friend, Pete Waldron, spared none of his genius in writing what was the most eloquent, touching tribute to John. It was talked about for weeks. And our friends, Val and Kevin, volunteered to take the role of funeral coordinators. Val came to the house one day armed with a folder of programs and mass cards from past funerals. I started to question why she might be collecting these things, but at that moment it became very obvious and helpful. We chose songs recollected from family funerals, and enlisted Maura Brennan (our young neighbor and recent graphic designer grad) to design the items we needed. She was honored to be asked, and in the end did her old friend Mr. McGeary proud.
Val and Kevin kept the decision making and planning moving along so that when we arrived at the rectory we had picked all the songs and readings for the funeral. I still had to write the petitions (I wanted them to be personal and meaningful), and Charlie was preparing the eulogy. The kids and I knew all too well that we wouldn’t be able to talk that day. The only thing I needed to clear with the church was that our friend, Nick, would be able to sing The Parting Glass at the end of the service. It is a favorite Irish blessing of mine, most recently made popular by the singer Ed Sheeran. I knew Nick’s rendition of it would be stunning and it would end the mass. Lastly, I needed to impress upon Monsignor that he had to keep his eulogy upbeat. At our house the night John died he said a prayer and kept referring to John taking his own life as “that one dark moment.” Clearly, it was. But he didn’t say it once, he said it many times. In fairness, it isn’t easy to talk about suicide, and no one at that moment knew what to say or wanted to believe that suicide was what took place. It’s just that the phrase made the moment more ominous than it already felt and I didn’t want that sort of feeling lingering in people’s minds as they left the church. There was no question it would be sad, but the John that people knew was happy and gregarious. I wanted them to remember that man.
All set at the church, I knew the next stop would steal the breath right out of me. I wasn’t overly anxious, I just didn’t know what to expect, how they would have the room, him, prepared. I remember arriving outside the funeral home thinking, “This is crazy. What are we doing here.” There was something about the feeling, as though I needed to stay in control, very matter of fact. I think it kept me from falling apart. What I remember is that the moment we stepped foot inside the funeral home I felt as though I could vomit. I asked everyone to hang back for a minute. The family came with us; mom and dad, Charlie, Jen and their kids and KK and Chuck. I just needed a moment to be with him by myself.
It was as Sonya said it would be, he was completely covered in white cloths. All that was showing was his hand. That was enough for me to know it was him. I would have known it anywhere. I so desperately wanted to fold back the clothes and see his face, or even his big toe. It seems so silly, but seeing that big toe would have made me happy. I should have asked to see his feet. He had an unmistakable big toe. The kind you would find on the foot of Fred Flintstone. Just the two of us, I held his hand and I cried. It was so unfair, his hand was ice cold. I wanted it to be warm so that it would be just like holding his hand the week earlier. It should have been warm. I told him how much I loved him and how sorry I was for not being a better partner and friend when he needed me. For all the times I teased thinking it was funny when maybe he didn’t, for my incessant need to have things “just so,” and for not being patient and more helpful when it came to things like the computer. He hated that he wasn’t more computer savvy, but what he never really understood was that I wasn’t any better. And that I couldn’t, and still can’t, work the TV remote. I prayed that he was somehow present with me in that room and that he forgave me. We had so much to look forward to, and we were on the verge of finding our way back to that twenty’s kind of place where we talked and hung out together and were ready to have fun adventures again. We were there. We were so close.
I went back and got the kids and we greeted him as a team. Stacking our hands on top of his we told him that we would love him forever. We talked to him and about him, we cried and let him know how upset we were about his decision. A short time later the rest of the family joined us. It was hard to know what to say. The usual viewing small talk goes something like, “Wow, he looks so good, they did a great job.” Mostly there were tears, and questions. The same, God damn questions.
It was time to go. Leaving him was hard. He made a decision five days earlier in what must have been a state of helplessness. And now we were all walking out on him. The kids and I stayed back for a few minutes to say our final goodbye. We huddled up one last time, each of our hands stacked on the other, my hand touching john’s, and told him he was in our hearts always. As we walked away, Brendan turned around. With a grin on his face he walked back to where john lay and gave a little tug on his finger. All of us looking at him quizzically he shrugged and said, “I couldn’t resist, you know dad would have said ‘hey, pull my finger.”
Comentarios