It was a blur. It's still a blur and it's the next morning. I don't know that I've ever talked to that many people that I wanted to talk to or who wanted to talk to me. My brain is still spinning from all of the thoughts, my own and those of others, all the words, all the faces all of the pictures of my mother projected up on the big screen.
We all kept saying my mom would've love this. I'm not sure if she would've liked all the focus on her, but it wasn't like she hated having any focus on her. She just didn't think it was all about her. Which this wasn't either, it was about all of us getting together to talk about and celebrate the life of someone who affected many people.
People who came to this thing knew my mom for different lengths of time and with different levels of closeness. Those who have known her the longest were not surprised by much of anything anyone said. Those who knew her less well must've been shaking their heads in amazement.
A lot of people really really really loved my mom. On the surface of all it was a simple as that. But with her openness and her positive outlook, she affected everyone in different ways. She affected them in whatever way made sense for them. She knew it wan't about her, She was just a facilitator.
It seemed to start earlier faster than I had anticipated. Ronnie and I got to the city around 1:30 and walked over to the theater. It's a beautiful little theater, with a lovely lobby with a bar in the middle that made for a great receiving area.
I went inside the theater to get used to the space and run through what I was going to say, and by the time I came out to the lobby, it seems as if people were already coming.
Although I knew off the bat that my remarks would be inspired by all of the pictures that I scanned, it took me a very long time to actually come up what I want to say. It's complicated, you know, it was my mother. And like most parent child relationships it had its ups and downs, some lefts, some rights, some spins around that seemed random and needless and dumb but end up adding up to a life of some sort.
It was people I'd seen last week, people I'd seen last month, people I've seen last year, and people I've seen in the last century. Literally seeing people who I had not seen in probably 20-30 years. They all recognize me, want to talk to me and for the most part, I recognized them. I knew their connection with my mom and with my family and with me. There were just a ton of them.
The thing is, we never had a funeral or wanted to have a funeral. My mom’s end of life came in such a way that it didn't seem proper or I don't know, it didn't seem right to have a funeral. Plus my dad would have none of it, because we decided at the time the last thing mom would want to be a bunch of people sitting around morning her. That would have been completely antithetical to everything she stood for and everything she was. So we decided to plan a celebration, my brother, my sister, my father and I. We all decided how we are going to contribute to make it happen. As I mentioned, my main part was to scan all the old photos.
My brother focused mostly on picking the venue and deciding what the program would be. We would have a few key people speak- family and close friends, a half-dozen of them. And then we would open up the mic for anybody who wanted to speak as well. And the tone was not to be mournful at all. It was to be light, fun, uplifting if possible, but the kind of thing my mom would've enjoyed.
We started planning in the summer, and decided to do it in early November, before the holidays really got going and weather might interfere with people getting here, because people were going to come from all over. My sister had the task of whittling down the guest list, and cajoling my father into not inviting every single person my mom ever knew, because the theater only held 300 people.
So we settled the time, place, and guest list. wWe invited people; they RSVPed. it was happening some time in the future. Then suddenly it was time. The programs were printed, with people arranged to speak in a particular order, attendees made their travel plans, all that stuff.
Strip it down to the bare minimum and this is what it was. I stood in the lobby of the theater, greeted over 200 people. Then it was into the auditorium, where I sat down and waited my turn, got up onstage said some stuff. It was very bight on the stage- I couldn’t see anyone.
Then I came down off the stage and watched the rest of the people speak. Some were serious and heartfelt. Some were funny, some were both. And mine, I think, was kind of raw and unhinged, but people seemed to like it. Then we showed a video with a montage of the photos I’d scanned. And the program was over. Right on time. About an hour and a half all told. We took some photos and then out to the lobby again, where I got to talk to all of the people I'd spoken to on the way in and many many more. For another hour and a half.
At this point, around 7:00, a select few, 70 of us all told, gathered for dinner upstairs. I sat with my wife and cousin and made no effort to circulate because everyone was coming to me.
Dinner was good, I think, though I don't really remember the food or eating. Talking, talking, talking and then about an hour after it was supposed to end, it finally ended at 10:00. And we came back to the hotel, I went out and bought a beer but didn't drink it and fell asleep on the end of the bed while Ronnie and Celia sat in bed and watched TV.
Looking back, that was one of the most intense experiences of my life. Not everything that everyone said was an emotional outpouring or deeply meaningful, but the cumulative effect was as if it had been. I feel completely wrung out. And now I'm left waiting for the blur to clear somehow. All those people and all the stuff they said. It's simply overwhelming and pretty damned wonderful.
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