rcj@burl.UUCP (Curtis Jackson) (08/19/86)
[STella, my condolences on the death of your father, and my accolades on your mature handling of it. I'd very much like to meet you someday just to give you a big hug!] In article <1007@frog.UUCP> sc@frog.UUCP (STella Calvert) writes: >humor. In my family a wake seems to consist of sitting around eating >too much and telling every embarrassing story that ever happened to >the ghost of honor, punctuated with "but it's awful to be laughing >like this...." Now I don't see the awfulness, though I guess I'll be >required to look somber when someone stops laughing long enough to say >it.... To me it makes great sense that we laugh when we hurt, though >I've heard a lot of people on the net saying that some things just >aren't funny. Tonight I watched a rerun of _Moonlighting_, in which Hogwash (to those netters). Christmas of '84 found me in my great-uncle and aunt's beautiful Georgetown apartment with the two of them (John and Liz) and John's two surviving brothers: great-uncle David and my grandfather Hoyt. All of them were talking about my great-grandmother (their mother)'s funeral in Alabama -- she had died in her late nineties of terminal cancer. They were all relieved to see her out of pain, but were very uncomfortable at the funeral home. The funeral home director proceeded to come out and sit with them and was not only very attentive to them but was very funny -- he made every funeral joke known to mankind. At first they started with nervous chuckles, then ended up in great bursts of laughter mixed with tears -- all their feelings bursting out of them at once. They all laughed (with bittersweet eyes) as they talked about the funeral hom director, and every one agreed that he made the experience so much more bearable for all of them. They also agreed that that is what my great-grandmother would have wanted. In New Orleans, when a jazz musician dies, the Olympia Brass Band leads a solemn dirge-playing procession down the streets of New Orleans to the cemetery; pall-bearers in tow. They put the coffin into the ground, say the few customary words, then turn around and raise hell with parasols and umbrellas dancing in the air, beautiful wild jazz ringing off the buildings. The message: "We're sorry you're gone, but as you always knew -- life goes on, and we're gonna have one for you tonight, old friend!" If only I could get such a sendoff! >selfishly VERY glad he got out before uncontrollable pain caused him >to ask me to "help" him die. I'll never regret not having to give him >the book I got from the Hemlock Society.... (Thanks for the address, >anonymous netter....) I'm glad, too, STella. For any of you netters who disagree with the aims of the Hemlock Society, consider my great-aunt Liz (mentioned above), who went from an extremely vivacious and intelligent woman to near death in about 6-7 months due to an inoperable tumor. I just found out tonight that my sister went to visit her, and after Liz calmed down after a fit (seizure) caused by loss of control due to the tumor, she said, "What kind of quality of life is this?" My father on the phone tonight made me reiterate my promise to help him leave this plane if he ever gets that bad off, and I did. >And most of all I'm glad that before he died I was able to make the >distinction between liking him (he was an unlikeably intolerant racist >fundy) and loving him. If you're down on your living parents, don't >reconcile with them for THEIR sake, but make your peace with them for >your sake -- because the dead have an overwhelming advantage -- they >never answer back. And having the last words be "I love you" rings a >lot better. Couldn't have said it any better; just had to quote it again. -- The MAD Programmer -- 919-228-3313 (Cornet 291) alias: Curtis Jackson ...![ ihnp4 ulysses cbosgd allegra ]!burl!rcj ...![ ihnp4 cbosgd akgua watmath ]!clyde!rcj