Today I went to a funeral for a distant family member. She was - I believe - my grandmother's cousin. We may have met once when I was a child but I've met so many people over the years that they've often blurred together and I cannot be certain.
Funerals are interesting occasions, nevertheless.
The visitation was full of a few familiar faces in a sea of strangers. I caught up with the few people that I knew. A darling little 93-year-old woman approached me and we small-talked for a full ten minutes. She was the mother of a family friend and had known my grandmother. She told me about living in Denver and then her recent move to Arizona. She liked the Arizona climate, she said. She wasn't embarrassed when she blurted out, "I have so much crap in my purse," when she was handed a small pack of tissues by her daughter. Soon she was swept away by a throng of relatives and I found myself alone, people-watching. Later Dad told me that old people liked me because I treated them as people, not as the old fogies that most people my age believe they are.
As I sat in the pew next to my father, I thought about losing my grandmother just a few years before. I empathized with the deceased's family sitting in the front rows, with their used tissues, red eyes, and quiet tears. I found myself wiping away a few random tears as I realized that someday I will be sitting in the front row of my own parents' funerals.
It's a terrifying and yet a strangely comforting thought. We may live our lives differently, speak different languages, have different interests, but we all go though the same cycle of life and death. In a way, it's not unexpected because we will all get there someday - we just have no idea when.
And that is Nature's ultimate secret.
So, carpe diem. Do extraordinary things. Be magical.
Ninety-three seems so old, but in terms of the Universe, it is only a blink of the eye.
Blessed be.
Funerals are interesting occasions, nevertheless.
The visitation was full of a few familiar faces in a sea of strangers. I caught up with the few people that I knew. A darling little 93-year-old woman approached me and we small-talked for a full ten minutes. She was the mother of a family friend and had known my grandmother. She told me about living in Denver and then her recent move to Arizona. She liked the Arizona climate, she said. She wasn't embarrassed when she blurted out, "I have so much crap in my purse," when she was handed a small pack of tissues by her daughter. Soon she was swept away by a throng of relatives and I found myself alone, people-watching. Later Dad told me that old people liked me because I treated them as people, not as the old fogies that most people my age believe they are.
As I sat in the pew next to my father, I thought about losing my grandmother just a few years before. I empathized with the deceased's family sitting in the front rows, with their used tissues, red eyes, and quiet tears. I found myself wiping away a few random tears as I realized that someday I will be sitting in the front row of my own parents' funerals.
It's a terrifying and yet a strangely comforting thought. We may live our lives differently, speak different languages, have different interests, but we all go though the same cycle of life and death. In a way, it's not unexpected because we will all get there someday - we just have no idea when.
And that is Nature's ultimate secret.
So, carpe diem. Do extraordinary things. Be magical.
Ninety-three seems so old, but in terms of the Universe, it is only a blink of the eye.
Blessed be.
