Smile -- Pearl Jam

[Just go ahead and listen to this song, ok?]

When we buried Uncle Jim it rained. I wore a grey turtleneck sweater and grey plaid slacks and slipped my dress shoes off and my tennis shoes on before exiting the car into the rain. That much of my memory is perfectly clear.

Uncle Jim gave us the upright piano that sat in the living room at Mom and Dad's house for years. I remember lessons during which I learned scales and simple songs in the school in Middleburg. And, later, in middle school, Mrs. Tapscott taught us to play My Heart Will Go On in the music room before school each morning. I was never really that good at piano, though.

I remember wishing it would rain at Mom's funeral. I remember thinking, if only the sky would cloud up and pour the rain--thunder, lightning and all, like the tears I couldn't bear to release. We forgot the music that day, and Uncle Scott raced to Grandpa's and back in record time to retrieve their copy. I felt bad. Wasn't I supposed to grab that from Dad's before we left? Didn't I think to myself, did we get that cd, was it in the CD player or by it? And there must have been a million other things I was doing to get myself and the girls ready for the funeral, and it just slipped my mind.

I was nervous. All I could think about was what I was going to say when I got up there. I was doing okay until I realized that Homer was speaking first and was going to make me cry before it was even my turn.

When I got up there I planned to say something like, "We wanted to share a story about Mom that was funny, but then every story we could think of was wildly inappropriate (big surprise)! And since everyone knew how much we knew Mom loved to read, and we wanted to share her favorite poem.." Then, as I began reciting The Children's Hour, I got choked up, and I saw Uncle Roger get up and make his way to me, What's he doing? And then he was there, arm around my shoulders and whispering encouraging words. I took another deep breath and continued.  When I was finished, I hurried back to my seat and completely forgot about putting the framed poem on the casket, like I meant to. After everyone had come around and hugged us all, I turned to Jamie and sobbed for the first time. I reached out to gather Addison into my arms, but she wasn't having it. I pressed my face into Jamie's chest and just let the wall down for a minute. I smeared a good amount of mascara on the front of his shirt. You really just need waterproof mascara for funerals, but that's the last thing you're thinking about when you're getting ready for one.

When we went to the cemetery, after everything was over and they'd lowered the casket, I watched some of the others throw in shovels full of dirt. But not me. I was miserably pregnant and didn't shovel any dirt myself. Some funerals end and everybody leaves before the casket is even lowered. But not us.

Back at the church there was food prepared and as I made my way along the line to fix my plate, my 3rd- and 4th-grade teacher smiled at me and said, "That was a beautiful poem you shared."

And I said, "Oh, I didn't write it," like the fucking dumbass I am. Like I write so much brilliant shit that it could be mistaken for Longfellow.

"I know," accompanied by an understanding smile. I beat a hasty retreat back to our table.

Why am I such a spaz? Four years later and I'm still bothered by my inability to say something--anything--that didn't sound stupid. Like maybe thank her for coming? Something?

But I am a spaz. I never say the right thing, and I probably never will. I guess I shouldn't worry so much about what happened four years ago, especially since I had every excuse for being awkward.

For the visitation we wore summer dresses. Mine was coral. Some of my friends came, girls I'd been friends with since elementary school. When I stood up to hug them and thank them for coming they were like, "Whoa, you're pregnant!" Apparently, when sitting, I just looked fat. It had been a few years since they'd seen me. I still smile when I think about that.

I guess the hardest part of the visitation was trying to explain things to Addison--she wanted to know, "Is that GG over there?" pointing to the casket. The simple answer, "Yes," popped out, but what was churning in my mind were all the reassuring things I'd heard throughout my life, "That's just her body, her soul is in heaven."

I had to buy shoes for Mom's funeral, too. Amy drove my car, and Jessica and I rode back to Louisville to retrieve funeral attire--or in my case, buy some because I didn't have any black maternity clothes. I told the lady who helped me find some black flats that I needed a different size because I had massive toe cleavage. She thought it was funny, but I hate toe cleavage.

It's odd, the things you remember. There's more, a lot more, but remembering and recounting is painful, so you'll just have to wait until next time.

Your Song -- Ellie Goulding

When Grandma Cordia died we went to their house, just a short drive away. Seventeen minutes. That's about how long it takes to get to Grandpa's house. We knew what had happened, our Grandma had been sick for a while, with Mom splitting her time between caring for her and taking care of us and business. It was hard. We knew the day was coming, but, as a child, I remember feeling unsure about how to react to the situation. We were reluctant to go inside. Instead, when we got out of the car we went and played outside, in the trees in the front yard, the pair on the left side, if you're facing the old white farmhouse.

Later Billie took us to buy dress shoes for the funeral. Somehow I had already outgrown the dress shoes I had. I just remember being in the shoe store, sitting on the bench, and trying on shiny black patent leather shoes. I remember wearing a black skirt and a white blouse. I can't recall much more about it than that, other than everybody being upset. I was just a kid then, though. Memories when I was a child are odd. Bits and pieces of scenes and very specific things remain, and some things are just...gone, like a dream you just woke from and can't recall with perfect clarity. 

I remember Grandma teaching us to play rummy. Which really just means we played rummy with Grandma a lot, and  listened to her and Mom talk. When she and Mom got to talking...well, we laughed a lot. there was always a funny story to be recalled, and much of the time was spent talking at the kitchen table.

Going to Grandma and Grandpa's was happy fun times, with Woody the Woodpecker cartoons and oatmeal cream pies. Memories are filled with family events everyday activities, and food...giant kettles of popcorn, cornbread and milk, grapes off the vine, circus peanuts, apples and pears from the orchard, and, if you got to them before the birds, cherries from the tree in the front yard.

When I was a little older, our Aunt Sis died. It happened while I was at 4-H camp. I remember crying when I got the news, a phone call that warranted a visit to the camp office in the company of one of my counselors. I can't recall, however, if it was Mom or Dad I talked to on the phone, but I handed the phone back to the counselor and went back to my bunk and cried. I had to explain to all the other girls what was going on.

"Were you close?" someone queried, and I said yes. But how do you describe what someone really means to you? I remember cards from Sis every birthday, holiday, illness, and significant events/achievements. I remember hunting Easter eggs at Sis & Robert's house, and Daniel always finding the lucky goose egg. At their house they always had candy dishes of mints and hard candies, jars of multicolored candy canes, and glass bottles of soda in the fridge downstairs. I can't remember her funeral, what I wore or anything.

When I was a freshman in high school our Grandma Roark died. I remember being curled up in a chair at the funeral home at Grandma Roark's visitation. I wore this black velvet dress with one of Mom's blazers because it was cold. There were so many people I didn't recognize and I asked Mom who they were, "People your Grandmother helped..." And I imagined Grandma in the kitchen plating up a meal in the middle of the night--I recall homemade spaghetti-- because we were going to arrive.

We were always up to shenanigans at Grandma Roark's house. Throwing rocks at cars in the street, buying condoms and candy at the little store down the street, making crank phone calls from Grandma's phone, playing mean tricks on Uncle Mac, or playing werewolf on the waterbed with the door closed, lights off, and fan on burn-down-the-house speed. Or, my favorite family reunion memory...when Sarah and I chased the ice cream truck way down the street but never caught it and so Grandma took all of us kids to the Dairy Queen down the street and bought us ice cream. I got a chocolate-dipped vanilla cone...

My memories are not reliable, though. Sometimes my mind drags forth a scene from my memory, and springs it on me, an image rising from the depths of my mind as if to remind me they're in there somewhere.

I remember Sam fixing our hair for family weddings, and I remember her asking me if I wanted her to do my hair, even though she'd done so many others' already. She coiffed my hair along with all the other girls. Back when we were kids it was curls galore and teased up bangs. And lots of aerosol hairspray. Sam always had all the best hair stuff.

As kids, we played at Grandma and Grandpa's farm, outside in the company of their border collie, Lassie, who lived up to the name, and killed snakes in the yard. We had fun jumping on hay bails, climbing apple trees in the orchard,  playing with tobacco sticks in the barn, playing hide-and-go-seek when it got dark.

Sometimes we went up north to visit our family. On those trips we had fun spending time with our cousins. I remember, specifically, a visit during which we went with Sam down the street to pick out a movie at a lady's house. I remember a whole wall of movies. And I'm pretty sure it was Sam who thought we should watch It.

Yesterday we laid Sam to rest.

It seems like only yesterday we were together, riding through the field in the back of a pick-up truck with our own kids smiling and playing together. Cousin time.