My Father's Funeral / Eulogy / Busy at Work / Abby's Wedding / Daniel Moves to Portland / Sam Dies
Once again, too much time has gone by since my last entry. This time it's been more than four months. I do often think about posting and it's something I feel guilty about keeping up on even though literally no one reads this. But I guess it's always been really just for myself anyway. It's been a long four months.
My father's funeral was Thursday, January 19th, at a church in a nearby town. The lead up to the event was strange: Family coming in, time off from work, so many decisions. It was surreal. Long before his death, my dad asked his brother, Roger, to officiate any funeral. We had all hoped that wouldn't happen but there we were. The night before, I was encouraged to agree to give a eulogy. I was afraid to accept but felt I was in the best position to say something meaningful considering I lived with my parents the longest into my late twenties. I wrote the whole thing in one sitting and I believe that just like the rest of the day, it all turned out wonderfully.
I spoke about who he was and his education. I talked about how my parents met and where we all ended up. I avoided all talk about his cancer illness and deterioration. While I'm sure people had questions about that, it could have been spoken to elsewhere. The last half of the eulogy was a story I remember from when I was much younger of an incident that shaped me as a moral human being. I was caught being a naughty little kid but instead of yelling or hitting or punishing me, my father told me--in a calm voice--that he'd lost respect for me and didn't know when we'd be friends again. Like nothing ever before or after in my entire life, that forever affected me and completely molded my personality and how I interact with people. I may not have been conscious it at the time, but the one person on Earth for whom I desired friendship and respect from was indeed my father. And now all these years later he's actually gone.
My voice cracked and I took several pauses as I read the eulogy through tears that day. My best friends hugged me afterward and held me. Nicole said she'd never been more proud of me. In the afternoon, my father's body was laid to rest at a military cemetery in Portland. They really pulled out all the stops; a color guard, taps, officiants, and a real American flag. It was glorious and awe inspiring. His final resting place is on a quiet hillside surrounded by thousands of other military personnel. It's a good place. I was relieved that his long journey was at an end and now he can rest in peace.
Since then it's been a strange road. We're all grieving (Or not) in different ways. For me, there's the obvious hole in my life but I'm typically so consumed with my normal life that I'm not letting any depression in. Or maybe I just don't feel it. We had more than a year to say goodbye and now that it's over, we can all move on and live our lives. I want to believe he'd want us to quit crying and keep going. I would want that of my family.
Obviously, everyone's mostly concerned with my mother, who has her good days and her bad days. The house she lives in is a lot of work to keep up but it keeps her busy. Maybe it takes her mind off things to have those little activities. Time will tell how she does but each day, she seems to go a little further.
It's been a rough few months at my job, too. The company I work for has been accepting new business at such an incredible rate that we've all been unreasonably busy for months. Every so often, they tell us it's only going to get worse, too, so there's no stopping. We've begun hiring in my little department, too, which is entertaining. For years, it's just been only the four of us across all the different shifts. I trained the first guy for a month before he was set loose on his own shift. It stresses me out worrying about how he's doing on his own but I have to remember that we're all professionals here and he'll learn. To make things easier for us in the long run, I've agreed to spend the year writing procedures on everything my department does so that training the next person will be easier and more structured. Right now, nothing we do is really written down. It's only been the four of us so we've memorized everything which isn't good for new people. I've gotten raises and awards so I'm mostly content at the moment. Time will tell.
Nicole's best friend, Abby, got married in April to her boyfriend of the last couple years, a guy named Richard. They surprised everyone when not too long ago they decided to move to Montana and start their lives over. They were in Portland for the wedding, which was a treat. Nicole was the Maid of Honor and gave a speech during the reception. She stressed out for weeks beforehand as she's terrified of public speaking. I will admit that it was rather adorable watching her stress out over the speech because I knew she'd nail it and she practiced a lot on me. And she did nail the speech. It was a great evening. Lots of dancing and drinking. At the end, we helped tear down the decorations and I had a bunch of lights dropped on me, shattering glass everywhere. Everyone was okay but it was a humorous end to a nice event. Abby comes back to Portland from Montana so often these days that we joke that we see her more often now that she lives far away than we did when she actually lived in Portland.
Speaking of people making big moves, my cousin on my father's side of the family, Daniel, accepted a job with a church in Portland and moved up here earlier this year. It's wild having him out here as I've not seen him since my epic road trip of 2005 when he was barely a teenager or thereabouts. We finally had him out for a meal on Easter last month and we were able to really visit. He seems cool! He's down to earth, loves the Portland culture, is into video games, and he's joining us in all our Tuesday evening movie excursions. It's fun having a new friend to visit with. We're even going to do a full-blown "Band Practice" one of these days with the Rock Band video games. Now that there's four of us including Bryan and Nicole, we have a whole band: Nicole is on vocals, Bryan on either lead or bass guitar, Daniel on drums, and I'll play whatever's leftover. It should be fun.
I hate to bookend my first entry in four months with more sorrow, but the last piece of news is that yet another beloved family pet has died. The family cat, Sam the Siamese, died just yesterday morning peacefully in his sleep after a very short illness. The cat was around 20 years old and already had kidney issues for years so he lived a good long life with my parents all these years. He came into our lives as a feral stray camping out under the house. Over time, my mother coaxed him out of the crawlspace and into the garage where he warmed up to humans and ultimately moved inside to live comfortably indoors for the rest of his life. He was a moderately affectionate cat who liked to get your attention by flicking his paw against your arm with his claws out. He never cuddled but just wanted to be around people. He never truly got along with Tucker, the resident ginger cat, but in their later years together, there was a peace between them. It's been a rough year for that house. My father, Tucker, Max the terrier, and now Sam all gone. My mom is now in that house totally alone aside from a few fish in a massive saltwater aquarium that my father left behind. It's hard to imagine just how difficult it is to go from a house full of life one year to just a big empty house the next. It's just going to be a long march into better days.
My father's funeral was Thursday, January 19th, at a church in a nearby town. The lead up to the event was strange: Family coming in, time off from work, so many decisions. It was surreal. Long before his death, my dad asked his brother, Roger, to officiate any funeral. We had all hoped that wouldn't happen but there we were. The night before, I was encouraged to agree to give a eulogy. I was afraid to accept but felt I was in the best position to say something meaningful considering I lived with my parents the longest into my late twenties. I wrote the whole thing in one sitting and I believe that just like the rest of the day, it all turned out wonderfully.
I spoke about who he was and his education. I talked about how my parents met and where we all ended up. I avoided all talk about his cancer illness and deterioration. While I'm sure people had questions about that, it could have been spoken to elsewhere. The last half of the eulogy was a story I remember from when I was much younger of an incident that shaped me as a moral human being. I was caught being a naughty little kid but instead of yelling or hitting or punishing me, my father told me--in a calm voice--that he'd lost respect for me and didn't know when we'd be friends again. Like nothing ever before or after in my entire life, that forever affected me and completely molded my personality and how I interact with people. I may not have been conscious it at the time, but the one person on Earth for whom I desired friendship and respect from was indeed my father. And now all these years later he's actually gone.
My voice cracked and I took several pauses as I read the eulogy through tears that day. My best friends hugged me afterward and held me. Nicole said she'd never been more proud of me. In the afternoon, my father's body was laid to rest at a military cemetery in Portland. They really pulled out all the stops; a color guard, taps, officiants, and a real American flag. It was glorious and awe inspiring. His final resting place is on a quiet hillside surrounded by thousands of other military personnel. It's a good place. I was relieved that his long journey was at an end and now he can rest in peace.
Since then it's been a strange road. We're all grieving (Or not) in different ways. For me, there's the obvious hole in my life but I'm typically so consumed with my normal life that I'm not letting any depression in. Or maybe I just don't feel it. We had more than a year to say goodbye and now that it's over, we can all move on and live our lives. I want to believe he'd want us to quit crying and keep going. I would want that of my family.
Obviously, everyone's mostly concerned with my mother, who has her good days and her bad days. The house she lives in is a lot of work to keep up but it keeps her busy. Maybe it takes her mind off things to have those little activities. Time will tell how she does but each day, she seems to go a little further.
It's been a rough few months at my job, too. The company I work for has been accepting new business at such an incredible rate that we've all been unreasonably busy for months. Every so often, they tell us it's only going to get worse, too, so there's no stopping. We've begun hiring in my little department, too, which is entertaining. For years, it's just been only the four of us across all the different shifts. I trained the first guy for a month before he was set loose on his own shift. It stresses me out worrying about how he's doing on his own but I have to remember that we're all professionals here and he'll learn. To make things easier for us in the long run, I've agreed to spend the year writing procedures on everything my department does so that training the next person will be easier and more structured. Right now, nothing we do is really written down. It's only been the four of us so we've memorized everything which isn't good for new people. I've gotten raises and awards so I'm mostly content at the moment. Time will tell.
Nicole's best friend, Abby, got married in April to her boyfriend of the last couple years, a guy named Richard. They surprised everyone when not too long ago they decided to move to Montana and start their lives over. They were in Portland for the wedding, which was a treat. Nicole was the Maid of Honor and gave a speech during the reception. She stressed out for weeks beforehand as she's terrified of public speaking. I will admit that it was rather adorable watching her stress out over the speech because I knew she'd nail it and she practiced a lot on me. And she did nail the speech. It was a great evening. Lots of dancing and drinking. At the end, we helped tear down the decorations and I had a bunch of lights dropped on me, shattering glass everywhere. Everyone was okay but it was a humorous end to a nice event. Abby comes back to Portland from Montana so often these days that we joke that we see her more often now that she lives far away than we did when she actually lived in Portland.
Speaking of people making big moves, my cousin on my father's side of the family, Daniel, accepted a job with a church in Portland and moved up here earlier this year. It's wild having him out here as I've not seen him since my epic road trip of 2005 when he was barely a teenager or thereabouts. We finally had him out for a meal on Easter last month and we were able to really visit. He seems cool! He's down to earth, loves the Portland culture, is into video games, and he's joining us in all our Tuesday evening movie excursions. It's fun having a new friend to visit with. We're even going to do a full-blown "Band Practice" one of these days with the Rock Band video games. Now that there's four of us including Bryan and Nicole, we have a whole band: Nicole is on vocals, Bryan on either lead or bass guitar, Daniel on drums, and I'll play whatever's leftover. It should be fun.
I hate to bookend my first entry in four months with more sorrow, but the last piece of news is that yet another beloved family pet has died. The family cat, Sam the Siamese, died just yesterday morning peacefully in his sleep after a very short illness. The cat was around 20 years old and already had kidney issues for years so he lived a good long life with my parents all these years. He came into our lives as a feral stray camping out under the house. Over time, my mother coaxed him out of the crawlspace and into the garage where he warmed up to humans and ultimately moved inside to live comfortably indoors for the rest of his life. He was a moderately affectionate cat who liked to get your attention by flicking his paw against your arm with his claws out. He never cuddled but just wanted to be around people. He never truly got along with Tucker, the resident ginger cat, but in their later years together, there was a peace between them. It's been a rough year for that house. My father, Tucker, Max the terrier, and now Sam all gone. My mom is now in that house totally alone aside from a few fish in a massive saltwater aquarium that my father left behind. It's hard to imagine just how difficult it is to go from a house full of life one year to just a big empty house the next. It's just going to be a long march into better days.