Memorial service, part 2: Guests (or, there's a party in the potty)
After we'd finished setting up the parlor for the service, several of us went upstairs to grab some food before everyone started arriving. I know I was there with my mom and my aunt; maybe my grandma joined us too. It might have been around that time that my cousin M arrived with her family; this was the first time I'd seen her daughter in two years. She's only 2.5. Anyway, I know my uncle made it up there before 2, because I discovered he shared a trait with my mom: The inability to open a bottle of pop slowly, so that the carbonation dissipates. Instead, he just cracked open a bottle, and it was ginger ale, which tends to explode all over the place if you're not careful. My mother does this regularly. And, well, apparently so does her brother. Well, the food table had a plastic cover on it, so no worries.
Mom had gone downstairs shortly before 2, and a few minutes later my dad came up and went, where's your mom? Her Red Hat friends are here! ...Uh, she left already...hmm. So I finished up (this was when Rose said bringing bottled water downstairs was okay, because I was about to leave mine on the counter) and went down to the parlor. Sure enough, just inside the doorway were a bunch of Red Hatters; mom claims there were six of them, but I saw six ladies in Red Hat finery plus a couple more with the group, so I claim there were eight. Regardless, mom wasn't with them, and I peeked around the corner into the second parlor; still no mom. Okay, better check the bathroom and then the car, because she couldn't be anywhere else. I go in the bathroom and one stall is occupied. Aha! Found her! She claims I went, what are you doing in here? Yeah, no, I think it's obvious what someone would be doing in there. I went, oh, you're here; your Red Hat friends are here. She then said, I've been stuck in here for 10 minutes; there's no toilet paper! Oh, lord. She'd been calling and texting my father and her brother, to no avail. Because, being at a memorial service, it would be rude to spend your time on the phone, especially given the guest of honor. So I got her toilet paper--then had to get her more; I tell you, she has a problem--and got her out of there. The hatters got a kick out of it; only my mother would get trapped in the bathroom at her father's memorial service. It turned out she'd texted SOS to her brother; one of the hatters went, should've texted SOL. Nice. When mom eventually saw the guys, they took out their phones and finally saw that she'd tried to get a hold of them. Well, it worked out. And this is why I make it a point of checking the holder for TP when I'm about to use the facilities. I learned this at, oh, age 10. Sometimes that just needs to happen once for you to catch on. But anyway.
It was impressive how many people showed up on the early side. Basically, if I didn't know someone, I figured it was one of my uncle's friends. I'd say either uncle, but I doubt my older uncle really mentioned anything to anyone (and, remember, he didn't show up, either). I would have liked to have met certain people, like my grandfather's doctor, but that's not how it worked out. That's okay. This doctor, though, was very kind to my grandfather and even made at least one house call, which is almost unheard of in this day and age in a big city. Considering my grandfather's mobility issues, especially the last couple of years, that's kind of what needed to happen, though. I also would have liked to have said hi to his landlords; I've met the wife, but not the husband. They're the reasons my grandfather lived where he did, which was not a choice the rest of the family would have made, but when you're dealing with German stubborn, there's not much you can do. The husband is the son of my grandfather's ex-girlfriend. Papa helped with the downpayment of the building they all lived in, and in return his rent was reasonable. This also, in theory, made it easy for him to see the girlfriend when she would come into town from Arizona. I think it was the landlords' wedding that made my grandfather realize he was wasting his time, though, because the ex's daughter is a flight attendant and can get her family free plane tickets, so long as they fly standby. However, when your son is getting married, it would behoove you to actually buy a ticket so you can be there on time. She didn't, she couldn't get a flight on time, and she missed the wedding. Nice. So, anyway, that's the reason my grandfather lives in not the greatest neighborhood ever (I have mentioned that a former governor lived down the street, right, at least before he went to prison?).
Not long after the service started, a woman walked in alone and sort of looked around carefully. She looked familiar but I wasn't entirely sure who she was. I almost thought it was my older uncle's girlfriend, actually, whom I haven't seen recently. It turned out to be a family friend, Dianne, sister of Judy. Judy's wake may well have been the last time I saw Dianne. We talked for a little while as mom was busy with the hatters (whom I did not get introduced to). Her daughter Beth is only a little bit older than me, and at one time we hung out briefly; this was nearly 30 years ago, which is kind of amazing. Others of mom's friends came, like Maria and her husband, and later Mary, who at one point lived across the alley from mom's family growing up. There was also a friend of my dad's who showed up with his wife, Dennis and Donna; they live relatively close to us (they've been out this way longer than we have) and mom and Donna have become good friends. This is only the second time I've met Donna, the first being at Jacob's wake, but we talked for a while. It was at that point that my lack of sleep over recent days started catching up to me, plus the fact that we were sitting down; I got a little dizzy and lightheaded. The moment would pass, but it would come again later in the day. It didn't help that I was up past midnight working on something for later in the service.
Around this time a number of my uncle's friends showed up, and they milled about more toward the front of the parlors; Donna and I were on a couch all the way in the back. I know that one person discussed that mom and grandma had wanted to invite was a woman named Jan. She was the niece of my grandparents' friends, Ed and Rose; they used to play cards together. I know I had been over to Ed and Rose's house on several occasions. (My mom was like, I'd ask my mom to babysit you, and she would go play cards! Yeah, that's grandma.) Jan did show up, and she walked up to me and thought I was my mom. No, sorry, but I'm her daughter! She's over there (and I pointed to mom, talking to someone else; I think that was when mom's supervisor had come by). There was someone else, a guy, who mistook me for my mom. I don't think my mom and I look *that* much alike, but when you haven't seen someone in a few decades, well, what can you do. I do know that one couple absent were Ricardo and Susan, very good friends with my uncle--like best man at my uncle's wedding--whom I met at M's wedding. Somehow my uncle and aunt were talking about them, but neglected to actually call them, then realized too late for them to arrange to be there. That was too bad, since I know Ricardo knew my grandfather to some degree. However, plenty of other people my uncle knew from his congregation showed up, and it was in part because they'd met Papa at different parties and things. Realize that Papa even lived with my uncle briefly, and my uncle hosted bible studies, so Papa met some of the friends that way. Despite my grandfather's aversion to religion, he would end up having nice discussions with the friends. I mentioned that his physician, Dr. Charlie, had shown up; the head of nursing at the retirement home also came, and had mentioned how nice Papa was to everyone and that everyone knew him, even the janitor--"Oh, yeah, room 300!" ...Really? *MY* grandfather? You sure you have the right person? But Papa was a salesman, just like his father, so he knew how to sweet-talk people. He just didn't use it with his own family. :P
Speaking of family...time for the family flow chart! My grandfather didn't have much family of his own; he did have a few cousins, but they all lived in Iowa or Nebraska (plus a few rogue ones in Wisconsin), and as I mentioned, his brother's family didn't live nearby. Therefore, grandma's family became his family. Even after they divorced, the nieces and nephews stayed in touch with him, which he appreciated. So it wasn't a surprise that all the branches of the family were represented.
--Branch 1: Both of Phil's daughters, at the very end; Son B; and Daughter D, with her husband. At one point grandma was talking to these three and she told them, (my mom) isn't having grandchildren! Grandma, I'm right here! Just because I won't go out with your dentist... Sheesh. Grandma was all, this is a private conversation! Yes, that you're having within five feet of me, and as usual you're talking loudly. (She'd also forgotten her hearing aids. Yay. But she did okay.)
--Branch 2: Daughter A, plus all three of her kids and the girls' kids. Her son was the first of them to arrive and was by himself for a while; he'd left his kids with the in-laws and was kind of glad to have the alone time. Once his nieces and nephews arrived, they piled onto a loveseat near the sign-in book and kept content with various toys and coloring books while the adults talked. Apparently the oldest of the kids, who's 8, asked, where's the man in the box? Sorry, there's no box here. (And, actually, it was his great-grandmother's death and subsequent cremation that led to my first-ever memorial service without a physical body, and his grandfather's death where I think maybe they rented a casket to have a viewing, then cremated him later. Daughter A probably gave mom some advice on the whole thing since she'd been through it all twice.) Also, and this was amusing, M's daughter, Miss O, saw the kids coloring and had to join them. Her dad would later say that she hasn't learned about personal space yet; she just crawled in and joined them, and after a minute or two they were cool about it. Miss O just helped herself to the twins' backpacks full of stuff. We did keep an eye on her, but she did pretty well with coloring, I have to say. Later, when the twins were kneeling on the floor and using the last row of chairs as desks, Miss O started walking across the chairs and counting as she did so. She can count at least up to five, because I heard her do that multiple times. It was more cute than annoying and the other kids didn't seem to mind. Plus, it was kind of awesome to see her playing with her third cousins. I can't imagine this happens much.
--Branch 3: Daughter A and her husband, plus her daughter and granddaughter (Miss K), as well as her second son. He came by himself and was also there for quite some time, like hours. He even tried to leave at one point but got sucked back into the stories I was telling the twins from Branch #1, since they missed them the first time around. (That was kind of hilarious--grandma started telling this cousin and my cousin-in-law--Miss O's dad--some stories about Papa, and she ended up swearing in one of them. My mother, knowing I was preparing something to say, had a major hissy fit over the thought of me going, "Oh, Christ!," which was one of his catchphrases, fearing I'd offend the holy rollers in the audience. Mom did not warn her mother about the same thing. So...yeah. Nice.)
--I know I don't have to mention Branch 4, but I will say it was nice for my cousins to meet their second cousins. They pretty much never attend anything, and the extended family isn't invited to their parties that I know of, so I spent a decent portion of time going, hey boys, this is *so and so*. I'm not sure they cared, but really, it's good to know your family will show up at times like this.
I think it was around 5 o'clock that a good portion of the crowd left. Hmm. See, I figured we should have a set time during which we could tell stories and share remembrances of Papa; I thought 6 would be a good time for that. My uncle agreed. Except...nobody bothered telling anyone about it. Like, if we had a prayer service, we would have announced that so people could plan around it. Since this wasn't my father, I was not in charge of telling anyone about the service; I would have mentioned a time. Heck, I'd have put it on social media, but that's not mom's style. So, yeah, when 6 o'clock rolled around, my uncle was sort of like, are we ready to do this? Yeah, what the heck. He wanted to go last, meaning I went first; nobody else spoke. And, well, being a writer, it went on for a bit. Mom and my uncle thought I'd have maybe a five-minute thing. I went on for at least 15 minutes, possibly 20. Just be glad I fit it onto three pages. I easily could've written more. I'd started jotting down ideas the weekend before he died, and I wove various parts of his life into this essay. I didn't read it verbatim but added and subtracted as I went along. For example, I'd mentioned some of grandma's family members toward the end, but they either weren't present or had left by then, so I skipped that part. I'd also neglected to mention the boys in the written version, oops, so I made sure to sneak them in. I'd wanted to make the audience laugh, which I did, so that was nice. Everyone was really impressed. And, as I figured, I did get caught by one thing I'd mentioned--my grandfather was raised Lutheran and had been a boy soprano. However, the only singing I ever heard him do was the worst version of "Happy Birthday" you'd ever heard. He would call us on the phone and sing it to us. I caught myself there; I mentioned, if you didn't know, my birthday was last week; I didn't get a call this year. Except for that point, I was able to make it through pretty okay. Nervous, but okay. My uncle was impressed with my public speaking abilities; he was like, you even made gestures! Well, yeah; I've done this before. You know I was a tour guide at one point, right? (And, well, I started doing readings at all-school masses at the age of five. I've got this. For as shy as I can be, I generally have no problem getting up in front of a group of people to talk.) The rest of the family, specifically my parents, were all, I can't believe you mentioned birthdays and holidays! Well, it wasn't my uncle's memorial. Clearly my grandfather celebrated such things, and he loved Christmas. I'd even mentioned the German stubborn, and both mom's friend Mary and a friend of my uncle's said they knew people who fit that bill. (Mary's half-German, so I knew she'd understand.) Oh, and Mary mentioned listening to my grandfather's airplane engines "every morning!" while growing up. They lived near each other for six years. Mom went, I can't imagine it was every morning, but clearly it's something Mary's remembered for the past 50 years. I should mention the audience, since again by that time most people had left. All the immediate family was there, and M's in-laws had arrived by then. They live in Dixon, which is quite a hike, so that was really nice of them to come. I really like her mother-in-law. There was one couple who were friends with my uncle (the wife was the German stubborn sympathizer). And then all the members of Branch 3 who came were there. So, not the biggest group, but enough all the same. Oh, I didn't talk about my uncle's part. His was far more religious than mine, and referred to several bible passages. I'm sure my grandfather wouldn't have cared for that, but that's how my uncle is. His was in the 5-10 minute range.
It must have been after our talks that we had...the incident. My second cousin, B, was with her daughter, Miss K, watching the DVD. Miss K got put down on the ground and Miss O came over and ended up giving Miss K a hug. Oh, how sweet. ...Until they lost their balance and tumbled over. Oh, dear. Miss O landed on the carpeting, but Miss K ended up hitting her head on the cabinet serving as a TV stand. Commence wailing. B ended up taking her out of the parlor, and we would find them up in the kitchen a little bit later. This is where little Miss O ended up impressing me: She ended up standing in the doorway, looking for them, very concerned. Oh, sweetie, she's okay. They'll be back. I was surprised at the amount of empathy in this little girl. After a little while, we ended up going to the kitchen, in part because it had to be cleaned up by 7:30, and we found B and Miss K there. B said after a bite of pumpkin bread, all was forgotten. :) See, my aunt's food has curative effects. We got the two little girls together, and there was another hug, and this time they stayed standing up. I got a picture of the two of them together and it's super cute. They were supposed to be born just a few weeks apart, but Miss K ended up being premature by a couple months (remember the already-born-baby shower?). Miss O also had her own bathroom shenanigans, at least where my mother is concerned. There were two separate bathrooms, and the mens' room was directly across the parlors' entrance. The ladies' room was all the way around by the other parlor, as well as the stairs going up to the kitchen. At one point, Miss O came out of the mens' room--alone. Mom wasn't at a good angle and was like, why is Miss O in the mens' room by herself? Uh, because she was with her dad, who's right behind her. I had a better angle and saw my cousin-in-law holding open the door for her. Mom found it hilarious, though, that Miss O just up and went to the boys' room. Oh, mom.
It was a long day, but it was nice to get it over with. We had discovered the bright side to doing services within just a few days; they get really prolonged otherwise. We'd had five days to deal with things and plan and keep planning and my goodness why is my uncle texting AGAIN about the silly posters? We had too much time to think about things. But my parents and I all had the next day off work to decompress, so that helped. All told, my mom was off work for almost two weeks--she'd had vacation the week of Thanksgiving, then obviously had the holiday off, then still got her three days of bereavement. Too bad it wasn't restful, but it worked out. We're still getting back to normal, our new normal, but that likely won't happen until at least the new year, when we're out of the apartment.
Mom had gone downstairs shortly before 2, and a few minutes later my dad came up and went, where's your mom? Her Red Hat friends are here! ...Uh, she left already...hmm. So I finished up (this was when Rose said bringing bottled water downstairs was okay, because I was about to leave mine on the counter) and went down to the parlor. Sure enough, just inside the doorway were a bunch of Red Hatters; mom claims there were six of them, but I saw six ladies in Red Hat finery plus a couple more with the group, so I claim there were eight. Regardless, mom wasn't with them, and I peeked around the corner into the second parlor; still no mom. Okay, better check the bathroom and then the car, because she couldn't be anywhere else. I go in the bathroom and one stall is occupied. Aha! Found her! She claims I went, what are you doing in here? Yeah, no, I think it's obvious what someone would be doing in there. I went, oh, you're here; your Red Hat friends are here. She then said, I've been stuck in here for 10 minutes; there's no toilet paper! Oh, lord. She'd been calling and texting my father and her brother, to no avail. Because, being at a memorial service, it would be rude to spend your time on the phone, especially given the guest of honor. So I got her toilet paper--then had to get her more; I tell you, she has a problem--and got her out of there. The hatters got a kick out of it; only my mother would get trapped in the bathroom at her father's memorial service. It turned out she'd texted SOS to her brother; one of the hatters went, should've texted SOL. Nice. When mom eventually saw the guys, they took out their phones and finally saw that she'd tried to get a hold of them. Well, it worked out. And this is why I make it a point of checking the holder for TP when I'm about to use the facilities. I learned this at, oh, age 10. Sometimes that just needs to happen once for you to catch on. But anyway.
It was impressive how many people showed up on the early side. Basically, if I didn't know someone, I figured it was one of my uncle's friends. I'd say either uncle, but I doubt my older uncle really mentioned anything to anyone (and, remember, he didn't show up, either). I would have liked to have met certain people, like my grandfather's doctor, but that's not how it worked out. That's okay. This doctor, though, was very kind to my grandfather and even made at least one house call, which is almost unheard of in this day and age in a big city. Considering my grandfather's mobility issues, especially the last couple of years, that's kind of what needed to happen, though. I also would have liked to have said hi to his landlords; I've met the wife, but not the husband. They're the reasons my grandfather lived where he did, which was not a choice the rest of the family would have made, but when you're dealing with German stubborn, there's not much you can do. The husband is the son of my grandfather's ex-girlfriend. Papa helped with the downpayment of the building they all lived in, and in return his rent was reasonable. This also, in theory, made it easy for him to see the girlfriend when she would come into town from Arizona. I think it was the landlords' wedding that made my grandfather realize he was wasting his time, though, because the ex's daughter is a flight attendant and can get her family free plane tickets, so long as they fly standby. However, when your son is getting married, it would behoove you to actually buy a ticket so you can be there on time. She didn't, she couldn't get a flight on time, and she missed the wedding. Nice. So, anyway, that's the reason my grandfather lives in not the greatest neighborhood ever (I have mentioned that a former governor lived down the street, right, at least before he went to prison?).
Not long after the service started, a woman walked in alone and sort of looked around carefully. She looked familiar but I wasn't entirely sure who she was. I almost thought it was my older uncle's girlfriend, actually, whom I haven't seen recently. It turned out to be a family friend, Dianne, sister of Judy. Judy's wake may well have been the last time I saw Dianne. We talked for a little while as mom was busy with the hatters (whom I did not get introduced to). Her daughter Beth is only a little bit older than me, and at one time we hung out briefly; this was nearly 30 years ago, which is kind of amazing. Others of mom's friends came, like Maria and her husband, and later Mary, who at one point lived across the alley from mom's family growing up. There was also a friend of my dad's who showed up with his wife, Dennis and Donna; they live relatively close to us (they've been out this way longer than we have) and mom and Donna have become good friends. This is only the second time I've met Donna, the first being at Jacob's wake, but we talked for a while. It was at that point that my lack of sleep over recent days started catching up to me, plus the fact that we were sitting down; I got a little dizzy and lightheaded. The moment would pass, but it would come again later in the day. It didn't help that I was up past midnight working on something for later in the service.
Around this time a number of my uncle's friends showed up, and they milled about more toward the front of the parlors; Donna and I were on a couch all the way in the back. I know that one person discussed that mom and grandma had wanted to invite was a woman named Jan. She was the niece of my grandparents' friends, Ed and Rose; they used to play cards together. I know I had been over to Ed and Rose's house on several occasions. (My mom was like, I'd ask my mom to babysit you, and she would go play cards! Yeah, that's grandma.) Jan did show up, and she walked up to me and thought I was my mom. No, sorry, but I'm her daughter! She's over there (and I pointed to mom, talking to someone else; I think that was when mom's supervisor had come by). There was someone else, a guy, who mistook me for my mom. I don't think my mom and I look *that* much alike, but when you haven't seen someone in a few decades, well, what can you do. I do know that one couple absent were Ricardo and Susan, very good friends with my uncle--like best man at my uncle's wedding--whom I met at M's wedding. Somehow my uncle and aunt were talking about them, but neglected to actually call them, then realized too late for them to arrange to be there. That was too bad, since I know Ricardo knew my grandfather to some degree. However, plenty of other people my uncle knew from his congregation showed up, and it was in part because they'd met Papa at different parties and things. Realize that Papa even lived with my uncle briefly, and my uncle hosted bible studies, so Papa met some of the friends that way. Despite my grandfather's aversion to religion, he would end up having nice discussions with the friends. I mentioned that his physician, Dr. Charlie, had shown up; the head of nursing at the retirement home also came, and had mentioned how nice Papa was to everyone and that everyone knew him, even the janitor--"Oh, yeah, room 300!" ...Really? *MY* grandfather? You sure you have the right person? But Papa was a salesman, just like his father, so he knew how to sweet-talk people. He just didn't use it with his own family. :P
Speaking of family...time for the family flow chart! My grandfather didn't have much family of his own; he did have a few cousins, but they all lived in Iowa or Nebraska (plus a few rogue ones in Wisconsin), and as I mentioned, his brother's family didn't live nearby. Therefore, grandma's family became his family. Even after they divorced, the nieces and nephews stayed in touch with him, which he appreciated. So it wasn't a surprise that all the branches of the family were represented.
--Branch 1: Both of Phil's daughters, at the very end; Son B; and Daughter D, with her husband. At one point grandma was talking to these three and she told them, (my mom) isn't having grandchildren! Grandma, I'm right here! Just because I won't go out with your dentist... Sheesh. Grandma was all, this is a private conversation! Yes, that you're having within five feet of me, and as usual you're talking loudly. (She'd also forgotten her hearing aids. Yay. But she did okay.)
--Branch 2: Daughter A, plus all three of her kids and the girls' kids. Her son was the first of them to arrive and was by himself for a while; he'd left his kids with the in-laws and was kind of glad to have the alone time. Once his nieces and nephews arrived, they piled onto a loveseat near the sign-in book and kept content with various toys and coloring books while the adults talked. Apparently the oldest of the kids, who's 8, asked, where's the man in the box? Sorry, there's no box here. (And, actually, it was his great-grandmother's death and subsequent cremation that led to my first-ever memorial service without a physical body, and his grandfather's death where I think maybe they rented a casket to have a viewing, then cremated him later. Daughter A probably gave mom some advice on the whole thing since she'd been through it all twice.) Also, and this was amusing, M's daughter, Miss O, saw the kids coloring and had to join them. Her dad would later say that she hasn't learned about personal space yet; she just crawled in and joined them, and after a minute or two they were cool about it. Miss O just helped herself to the twins' backpacks full of stuff. We did keep an eye on her, but she did pretty well with coloring, I have to say. Later, when the twins were kneeling on the floor and using the last row of chairs as desks, Miss O started walking across the chairs and counting as she did so. She can count at least up to five, because I heard her do that multiple times. It was more cute than annoying and the other kids didn't seem to mind. Plus, it was kind of awesome to see her playing with her third cousins. I can't imagine this happens much.
--Branch 3: Daughter A and her husband, plus her daughter and granddaughter (Miss K), as well as her second son. He came by himself and was also there for quite some time, like hours. He even tried to leave at one point but got sucked back into the stories I was telling the twins from Branch #1, since they missed them the first time around. (That was kind of hilarious--grandma started telling this cousin and my cousin-in-law--Miss O's dad--some stories about Papa, and she ended up swearing in one of them. My mother, knowing I was preparing something to say, had a major hissy fit over the thought of me going, "Oh, Christ!," which was one of his catchphrases, fearing I'd offend the holy rollers in the audience. Mom did not warn her mother about the same thing. So...yeah. Nice.)
--I know I don't have to mention Branch 4, but I will say it was nice for my cousins to meet their second cousins. They pretty much never attend anything, and the extended family isn't invited to their parties that I know of, so I spent a decent portion of time going, hey boys, this is *so and so*. I'm not sure they cared, but really, it's good to know your family will show up at times like this.
I think it was around 5 o'clock that a good portion of the crowd left. Hmm. See, I figured we should have a set time during which we could tell stories and share remembrances of Papa; I thought 6 would be a good time for that. My uncle agreed. Except...nobody bothered telling anyone about it. Like, if we had a prayer service, we would have announced that so people could plan around it. Since this wasn't my father, I was not in charge of telling anyone about the service; I would have mentioned a time. Heck, I'd have put it on social media, but that's not mom's style. So, yeah, when 6 o'clock rolled around, my uncle was sort of like, are we ready to do this? Yeah, what the heck. He wanted to go last, meaning I went first; nobody else spoke. And, well, being a writer, it went on for a bit. Mom and my uncle thought I'd have maybe a five-minute thing. I went on for at least 15 minutes, possibly 20. Just be glad I fit it onto three pages. I easily could've written more. I'd started jotting down ideas the weekend before he died, and I wove various parts of his life into this essay. I didn't read it verbatim but added and subtracted as I went along. For example, I'd mentioned some of grandma's family members toward the end, but they either weren't present or had left by then, so I skipped that part. I'd also neglected to mention the boys in the written version, oops, so I made sure to sneak them in. I'd wanted to make the audience laugh, which I did, so that was nice. Everyone was really impressed. And, as I figured, I did get caught by one thing I'd mentioned--my grandfather was raised Lutheran and had been a boy soprano. However, the only singing I ever heard him do was the worst version of "Happy Birthday" you'd ever heard. He would call us on the phone and sing it to us. I caught myself there; I mentioned, if you didn't know, my birthday was last week; I didn't get a call this year. Except for that point, I was able to make it through pretty okay. Nervous, but okay. My uncle was impressed with my public speaking abilities; he was like, you even made gestures! Well, yeah; I've done this before. You know I was a tour guide at one point, right? (And, well, I started doing readings at all-school masses at the age of five. I've got this. For as shy as I can be, I generally have no problem getting up in front of a group of people to talk.) The rest of the family, specifically my parents, were all, I can't believe you mentioned birthdays and holidays! Well, it wasn't my uncle's memorial. Clearly my grandfather celebrated such things, and he loved Christmas. I'd even mentioned the German stubborn, and both mom's friend Mary and a friend of my uncle's said they knew people who fit that bill. (Mary's half-German, so I knew she'd understand.) Oh, and Mary mentioned listening to my grandfather's airplane engines "every morning!" while growing up. They lived near each other for six years. Mom went, I can't imagine it was every morning, but clearly it's something Mary's remembered for the past 50 years. I should mention the audience, since again by that time most people had left. All the immediate family was there, and M's in-laws had arrived by then. They live in Dixon, which is quite a hike, so that was really nice of them to come. I really like her mother-in-law. There was one couple who were friends with my uncle (the wife was the German stubborn sympathizer). And then all the members of Branch 3 who came were there. So, not the biggest group, but enough all the same. Oh, I didn't talk about my uncle's part. His was far more religious than mine, and referred to several bible passages. I'm sure my grandfather wouldn't have cared for that, but that's how my uncle is. His was in the 5-10 minute range.
It must have been after our talks that we had...the incident. My second cousin, B, was with her daughter, Miss K, watching the DVD. Miss K got put down on the ground and Miss O came over and ended up giving Miss K a hug. Oh, how sweet. ...Until they lost their balance and tumbled over. Oh, dear. Miss O landed on the carpeting, but Miss K ended up hitting her head on the cabinet serving as a TV stand. Commence wailing. B ended up taking her out of the parlor, and we would find them up in the kitchen a little bit later. This is where little Miss O ended up impressing me: She ended up standing in the doorway, looking for them, very concerned. Oh, sweetie, she's okay. They'll be back. I was surprised at the amount of empathy in this little girl. After a little while, we ended up going to the kitchen, in part because it had to be cleaned up by 7:30, and we found B and Miss K there. B said after a bite of pumpkin bread, all was forgotten. :) See, my aunt's food has curative effects. We got the two little girls together, and there was another hug, and this time they stayed standing up. I got a picture of the two of them together and it's super cute. They were supposed to be born just a few weeks apart, but Miss K ended up being premature by a couple months (remember the already-born-baby shower?). Miss O also had her own bathroom shenanigans, at least where my mother is concerned. There were two separate bathrooms, and the mens' room was directly across the parlors' entrance. The ladies' room was all the way around by the other parlor, as well as the stairs going up to the kitchen. At one point, Miss O came out of the mens' room--alone. Mom wasn't at a good angle and was like, why is Miss O in the mens' room by herself? Uh, because she was with her dad, who's right behind her. I had a better angle and saw my cousin-in-law holding open the door for her. Mom found it hilarious, though, that Miss O just up and went to the boys' room. Oh, mom.
It was a long day, but it was nice to get it over with. We had discovered the bright side to doing services within just a few days; they get really prolonged otherwise. We'd had five days to deal with things and plan and keep planning and my goodness why is my uncle texting AGAIN about the silly posters? We had too much time to think about things. But my parents and I all had the next day off work to decompress, so that helped. All told, my mom was off work for almost two weeks--she'd had vacation the week of Thanksgiving, then obviously had the holiday off, then still got her three days of bereavement. Too bad it wasn't restful, but it worked out. We're still getting back to normal, our new normal, but that likely won't happen until at least the new year, when we're out of the apartment.