We'd gotten through Mom's visitation, and her funeral was the next day. My brother John figured he'd stay the night at my place even as his family headed for a motel. He'd brought his sleeping bag along, knowing in advance he'd be crashing on the floor.
It wasn't that late when we got back to Des Moines, or maybe it just didn't seem late to us, but all the restaurants in the neighborhood were closed, and we dined on cheap hot dogs from Quik Trip. Back at my apartment, we talked for awhile about everything but the obvious, then he went to bed. I laid in the darkness for awhile, my radio tuned low to classical music, punctuated by the pitterpat sounds of Delmar's feet, his claws not retracted as he made his nightly rounds.
The next morning we watched the Best Of The Electric Company DVD I'd just bought two weeks before, when everything still seemed right with the world. We talked some more, still not really speaking of Mom. But we had a timetable, and needed to get ready. Since my apartment is so small, privacy is impossible, so John went for a walk while I took a bath. (When he returned, he pointed out how many attractive women he'd seen in my neighborhood. "Why aren't you dating any of them?" he asked.) When it was John's turn to shower, I headed down to the (thankfully empty) laundry room in the basement, notebook in hand, to try to write down whatever the hell I was going to say at the funeral.
This was a given; despite a dread of public speaking, I had to make some kind of speech at the service. I would never forgive myself if I didn't. Thoughts had bubbled and dissolved in my head throughout this long, miserable weekend, and I had no idea what to say.
The notebook intimidated me, page after page of blank, indifferent lines not caring whether I filled them or not. I hadn't put pen to paper for several years, a punishing case of writer's block I simply ignored by not trying. But this situation demanded something, so I just scribbled without thinking, scratched some stuff out, ripped out a page or two, scribbled more and shrugged. It would have to do.
John and I ate Chinese food for lunch, the conversation still staying light, full of jokes, still avoiding emotion. I remember nothing of the drive up to Perry, or the preliminaries, and even the service itself is mostly a blur. At the minister's prompting, I stood up and said whatever I had to say, my body trembling with nerves and sorrow, but my soul finding some comfort in the sheer number of faces assembled.
I closed by looking at my brothers and sisters and nieces and nephews, telling them I loved them all. Even as the words tumbled out, I knew something had shifted. Mom was the hub around which we all circled, the force that kept us all together and aware of each other's comings and goings. Without her, the center was gone, and we all knew it.
After the service came another meet and greet, an opportunity to talk to old friends not seen for years, and finally some tears were shed. Then it was over, then my bothers and sisters and assorted members of their families regrouped to Mom's house. Much sorting and dividing and hauling out awaited us, but that was for another time.
Still, Mom had one dog and numerous cats, and they all needed homes. John had already said he'd take the dog, Rufus, and Scully, one of the cats. Everyone had already assumed I'd take Monika, despite my lack of space, and of course, I said yes. My sister Julie already had numerous cats at her place, but agreed to take sullen litter mates Nora and Noying. My nephew Shawn surprisingly stepped forward to take poor little Chloe, the least-loved of Mom's cats. "She'd have wanted me to," he shrugged.
Then that was it, the day was over, and everyone returned to their regularly scheduled lives. Julie left first, then my brother Mike and sister Ann. John's family had already left in a separate vehicle, and it was up to him and his son Matthew to load the rambunctious force of nature known as Rufus into their car. Shawn carried Chloe out to his pickup with surprising tenderness, waved and was gone. John and I continued to talk for awhile, but he had a long drive ahead of him and took off.
I watched them all go into the steely February evening, everyone in their own direction, all with separate destinations. I went back into the house and scooped up poor, baffled Monika, removing her from the only home she'd ever known. "It'll be okay, Kiddo," I whispered as she stared at me silently from behind the metal bars of her carrier. "You're starting a new life."
