Four Funerals, No Marriage by Mike Keren

Author:Mike Keren
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Woodhall Press
Published: 2021-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

Tom was against burying it with her.

I persisted. “She was always cold and may be again.”

“But it’s a waste.”

“It’s not a waste. It was for her and I want her to have it.”

Tom stopped arguing. We left it with the undertaker and went to make more calls.

The next afternoon, when we got to the funeral home, we were given time alone with Joan. I held Tom as we approached the coffin. The dress was perfect; she would have really been pleased. The blanket covered her to her waist, and her hands, clutching the beads, rested on top. As we looked at her face, we both choked back tears but had the same thought at the same time. We made a mistake. Without the eye shadow she didn’t look like herself.

People came in and out that evening. Our friends, her family, even a few of her new neighbors. Those who knew her best commented on two things: how beautiful the blanket was and the missing eye shadow.

Tom and I both addressed what a loving woman she had been and commented on the grace with which she had approached her illnesses. As I shared my recollections, I was impressed at how unpredictable life was. Twenty-five years earlier I would never have been able to extol my mother-in-law so, and now I was reduced to tears.

The next morning Tom and I met a few family members at the funeral home for a last goodbye and to close the coffin for the trip to Long Island. Joan’s cousin Karen spoke up. “That blanket is so beautiful, and you worked so hard on it. Take it home and remember her by it.”

Tom echoed her sentiments. “We’ll think of her whenever we’re nestled under it.”

“Okay. Take it,” I said, unconvinced but too exhausted to fight.

Just before the undertaker closed the casket, Karen said, “One last thing!” She walked up to the casket, took some blue eye shadow out of her purse, and applied it to Joan’s eyelids. “Now she looks like Joan.” Tom smiled, nodding his head.

That day was clear, and thankfully not too hot for the first of July. My brother Phil had come up to pay his respects and I asked him if he would take the responsibility to drive Mom and our friend Anne to the funeral. Anne, a former coworker of both Tom and mine, knew our mothers quite well. Age-wise she sat squarely between our parents and us and mingled easily in both age groups. She had begun having difficulty with arthritis and would appreciate not having to make the long drive herself.

Since Joan was laid out in New Jersey, we started the procession to the church on Long Island. Tom and I shared the limousine with a few of Joan’s cousins.

The ceremony was the most alienating of all. Although this had been Joan’s parish for most of the fifty years she lived on Long Island, her illness had kept her from being active the three or so years prior. I

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