For the last couple of weeks I have been working on an ebook about my mother’s passing.I am glad to say that I have let my friends and family members read it and it is now complete.

Please click here to download it!

My sister and aunt, so far throughout the process of going through all of mom’s stuff and deciding what to keep and so forth, have adopted the practice of talking to mom. If they can’t find something of mom’s that they know is around somewhere, they will ask her out loud where it is. They say this has helped them find things.

“Mom!” I’ll hear my sister call, “Where are those earrings grandpa gave you?!” or “Where did you put that scarf?”.

I am glad that they are finding ways to get through this, but I wish they wouldn’t do that.

True to his word, dad woke me up at 6:30 on the dot. He’s that kind of dad. I lay on the fold out bed listening to him and his partner Steve readying some breakfast for us.

I got up and pulled on a pair of pants. It’s no use bucking for more sleep, I’m on the foldout in the main room, they’re going to wake me up eating in the adjacent dining room anyway.

My dad and his partner Steve had prepared muffins, fruit, and turkey bacon for everyone. We all sat down and ate breakfast. My sister looked like she had been crying when she came to the table, and was already wearing her nice clothes. We talked about how much she likes turkey bacon. Chuck and I agreed that real bacon is where it’s at.

After breakfast I showered and got ready to go. As I suspected, I was done and ready with about 45 minutes to spare. Steve appeared in a towel and showed me which remotes operate the TV, then disappeared back into the bedroom to dress. I watched the History Channel for a bit through sleepy eyes that felt like they had sand in them.

Eventually everyone was ready and it was time to go. We all piled into Chuck’s SUV and drove back over to the Leak Memory Chapel, arriving right on time at 8:30 for the 9:00 service. Once again, I was in my suit and sunglasses. No one seemed to mind.

We went inside and I met the preacher who was to conduct the service. He was tall, stooped, and smiling. He wanted to know if I wanted to say anything. I said that I didn’t know if I did or not, so I thought I’d best not.

“I find that unless someone feels they must speak, it’s best not to,” he nodded, smiling.

I thanked him, and went off to get a cup of coffee. When I returned with it, my sister wanted to know where I got it. I showed her the coffee lounge. She cornered me about the sunglasses.

“You’re at your mother’s funeral.” she said.

“These sunglasses are one of the only reasons I am getting through this at all.” I told her. She let it go.

We went together back toward the room where mom was, arm in arm. When we got there, the preacher was asking everyone to shut up. He said a few words, and then gave my sister a small brown wooden cross as a token of something or other. He said the immediate family should follow him and the pallbearers should stand over there. We followed him.

There had been some consternation the day previous over who would be the pallbearers. At first I figured I would do it, but as it got to be the morning of the actual service, I decided I didn’t want to. I don’t know why I didn’t want to, I just didn’t. We found some other guys from the funeral party to handle it; yet another thing that was orchestrated by the ever-helpful Chuck.

The preacher led us into the main chapel where we sat in the front row. Starting at the aisle, it was Chuck, my sister, me, my grandfather’s wife Ms. Maurice, and my grandpa. My sister switched with Chuck so she could be next to me. She was holding a hanky and that little wooden cross in her lap.

They wheeled mom in.

The preacher walked up to the raised area at the business end of the chapel, and sat down on a chair off to the side as the organist finished the piece he was playing, which was about two seconds. Then the preacher stood back up and addressed us from the pulpit. He started off by saying that he didn’t intend to talk a lot about Jesus because he wanted to let Jesus shine through in the life that mom lived.

He had a point, mom sure loved her some Jesus. He smiled as he described all the ways that mom had loved Jesus and been a good christian. He recited many verses of scripture. He really had a lot to say about Jesus. I expected him at some point to just devolve into sentences consisting only of the word “Christ”.

“Christ christey christ christ!” He said in my mind, shaking his head. I smiled at this, then bit my lip to keep from smiling, then I realized where I was and I didn’t have to bite my lip any more. The preacher caught me smiling for a split second, and smiled back. I guess he thought I was smiling at the awesome power of Jesus.

I really thought all the Jesus business was overdone, but I kept reminding myself that this is exactly what mom would have wanted. I said all the prayers and went through all the motions.

Eventually he took a break and my aunt took the pulpit to talk about mom. She started off with a joke about how she could sense mom over her shoulder as she was writing it, telling her what to leave out. The preacher smiled hugely at the ceiling at this, and there was a little laughing. My aunt spoke for six minutes, because that’s how long the preacher had alotted for her.

Eventually she sat down, and we got back to the Jesus talk. The preacher was building himself up into quite a finale, his arms spread wide, his hands going ever higher with each new declaration of god’s greatness. Finally, it was over. They wheeled mom out through a side door and the pallbearers put her into the hearse. We left the chapel and regrouped outside in the lobby where everyone came up to us one by one to say how nice the service had been.

My roommates were there. I wanted to get out of there really badly, and it looked like things were thinning out, so I grabbed Chuck’s car keys from him and made for the parking lot. I got my stuff out of his car, piled it into my roommate’s, gave him his keys back, and split.

We had a few hundred miles to drive to where mom was going to be buried, next to her mother.

Once I was in the car with mom in Atlanta. She was driving me to Target to buy me a rice cooker for my birthday present a few years ago.

She pulled her big Ford Explorer into the parking deck, and swooped into the handicap lot near the door. She misjudged the distance, and bonked into a giant concrete pillar at the end of the parking space, giving us a significant jolt.

“We’re here!” she proclaimed.

I cooked rice in that cooker once, burned it, and could never get it out of the bottom of it properly, so I didn’t use it again. I told her it was still going strong, though. I’m so inconsiderate. I’m sorry mom, I miss you. Thanks for the rice cooker.

I got through the viewing. I had to make two more trips out to the car for shots of whiskey, but I made it through. I thanked everyone who spoke to me for coming.

Some of my oldest friends came out to see me, even though we haven’t been in good touch over the years thanks to me being slack about it. It really meant a lot to me that they would do that. My roommates Sam and Mellie also turned up. It was great.

I began to notice during the viewing the distinct differences between the way people talked to my sister and me. They shared memories with her, cried, and generally stirred up as many emotions as possible. I was grateful to talk to anyone who wanted to talk about anything but my deceased mom. I tried to smile through the few people who wanted to remember her in a tearful soliloquy, but most people seemed to realize that I wasn’t hip.

After the viewing I really wanted to go out and eat with my friends, but my Dad and his significant other Steve had dinner planned. I didn’t want to disappoint, so we all went over. It was really nice, Dad and Steve really know how to entertain.

Afterwards, Sam and Mellie and I went out for a beer at the bar I hung out in when I was living in Montgomery. IT was good to get out and not think about family any more than necessary. I kept it to one beer, though, since the service was the following morning at 9am and Dad was promising to get us all up at 6:30 since we had so many people to get through the showering and dressing process. By my calculations, we didn’t need that much time, but I was too tired to argue the point, and I figure it’s better to be ready early than late.

I couldn’t sleep. I never sleep well in unfamiliar surroundings. I have a ritual that I follow to go to bed, and if I have to deviate from it because I am in a strange place then I take forever to go to sleep.

I thought about mom. Cars drove by and cast oddly-angled patches of light on the walls that roamed around over Dad’s many paintings. I listened to a book on my ipod until I felt tired enough to sleep, but I lay awake after I took it off for a long time. I can never sleep anywhere but my own bed at night.