The first funeral I remember going to was for my great
grandpop, Paul. He was everything you could want in a grandpa; he had kind eyes
and was a master craftsman. He smelled like pipe tobacco and vanilla. He had an
affinity for cheese curls which he passed on to me, and on any given day you
could find the two of us with a bag of curls watching M*A*S*H and Hogan's Heroes
reruns. His death devastated me. Who was going to share their chair and snacks
with me? Who would make me more blocks or a new cradle for my baby doll?
Everyone struggled to explain death to me. They told me he was in heaven now
with the angels and he was at peace. I had no idea what any of that meant. Our
family was far from religious and in my mind angels went on top of Christmas
trees. I cried until I had no tears left, then I fell asleep. When I woke up, I
cried some more. It hurt. It made no sense. I didn't like it. I told everyone
who would listen that they were not allowed to die, because it made my heart
hurt. They smiled and called me sweet and precocious. They clearly didn't
realize I meant it.
Several years passed before I experienced another loss.
It was not any easier. My parents seldom went out, but when they did our
babysitter was Tommy. Our dads worked together and because of that our mothers
became friends. I remember my mother telling us that Tommy was sick and that
the next time we went to visit we had to be careful not to stare because Tommy
had lost his hair. He had leukemia at age thirteen. I was six. I had no idea
what leukemia was and when I asked I was quickly shushed; as if saying the word
meant the disease may find its way to me. We were not allowed to say it at home
and certainly not when we went to see Tommy. His illness seemed to take him
quickly. Each time we saw him he looked a bit smaller, weaker, sicker. The
treatments that were meant to save him were slowly eating away at him. Leukemia
scared me. There was no talking about it at home, and unlike today there was no
internet to turn to for answers, so I was left wondering. After he passed away
at the age of 17, a memorial tree was planted in his honor at the high school. My
mother did not allow us to go to the services and in fact did not even tell us
he had died until after the burial. I feel bad that I never understood what he
was going through. I feel good knowing that I could make him laugh by showing
him my newest Garbage Pail Kids trading cards. I think he knew how much we
adored him. Tommy's death struck me because he was young. It seemed unfair. He
would never grow up, get married, have kids, or any of the other things that we
are supposed to grow up and do. His death felt wrong.
While Tommy was fighting Leukemia, my great grandma,
Esther, was fighting dementia. She had always seemed a bit scattered, but after
Great Grandpa Paul passed, she got very confused. She had always been a bit of
a packrat, but her collections grew out of control. She saved bread bags inside
of grocery bags and twist ties inside of margarine dishes. She had hundreds of
empty yogurt cups which she washed, dried, and stacked in the cupboard where
the coffee mugs were now buried. She moved in with one of her sons, my great
uncle, and since his home looked similar to hers, it was an easy transition for
her. She had moments where you would swear she was fully lucid, but then she
would go on for ten minutes about how the number 7 smelled yesterday compared
to today and it was clear that the clouds in her mind were thickening. Her
former quirkiness was hard to decipher from her addled mental state when she
passed peacefully in her sleep, like her husband had. I think we all took
comfort in the notion that she and pop would be reunited and he could look out
for her again like he always had in life. While I certainly loved her, she and
I were just never as close as I was with Great Grandpop. Where he was funny and
loved to smile, she came across as serious and stern. I cried when she passed,
but as I was a bit older, I seemed to understand how to "appropriately"
grieve; Cry hard in private, and just a little in public.
The death that has hit me hardest though has got to be
Great Grandmom Yan, Amelia. She was amazing. She had the best smile and a laugh
that just warmed you to the core. Her love knew no limits and her fridge always
had chocolate milk and beer. She lived in a beautiful little bungalow on a
cobblestone street with a fenced in yard and a glider on the back porch. She
died on Valentine's Day, 1991. She had been sick for some time battling what
began as breast cancer but then quickly spread to her major organs. The little
bungalow sat cold and empty for nearly a year as she lived in a nursing home.
We went to see her as often as my father would take us, and each time we walked
in her face lit up with that amazing smile. She loved flowers and her favorite
color was purple, so I used to cut out pictures of purple flowers for her to
hang on the wall since real flowers were not allowed at the home. When she died
I was crushed. I had not hurt this badly since Grandpop Paul passed away when I
was a small girl. I was eleven now, and this was certainly not easier. I
understood that she was sick. I knew that she was in pain. I just kept wishing
for one more hug, one more smile, one more laugh. In the spring, we had to
clean out the little bungalow so it could be sold. All my life I had never been
allowed upstairs, and was always told it was closed off to keep it clean. This
may have been true, but it was also where she kept all her treasured memories.
She had pictures of her husband who died before I was born, the veil from her
wedding, and a costume jewelry collection like none I have ever seen. On my
wedding day I wore a pair of her earrings and her onyx wristwatch. I miss her
every day.
Her sister was my next loss. Aunt Blanche was amazing.
She was a pioneer for women's rights and was considered one of the original
members of Bell Telegraph and Telephone in Philadelphia. She never married and
never had any children. She was ridiculed for her life choices of work over a
family, but she loved what she did and she rewarded herself for it. Each
birthday she bought herself a lavish gift, a fur coat one year, a diamond
tennis bracelet another. She had multiple sets of the most beautiful china
dishes you can imagine, and many beautiful hutches to house them all. When she
became uncomfortable living by herself in Philly, she moved to Boyertown where
much of my family lives. They had just torn down the old casket factory and
built a beautiful retirement community in its place (no, I'm not making that
up). During the move, she saw my grandfather carrying out a pillow and quickly
asked where he was going with that. He said it was going in the truck and she
said it had to stay with her. He obliged and when they unloaded the truck at
the new place he found out why. She had it stuffed full of cash. She was a
funny lady and taught us all that "A glass of wine is only one glass, no
matter how many times you have to fill it." When she passed away, my aunt
wrote a brilliant eulogy in her honor full of her many words of wisdom. We were
all laughing through our tears. She really seemed to live just the life she
wanted to live with no regrets and no apologies. That is a gift.
When Grandpop Satterwhite passed away in 2011, I
crumbled. I was lucky to grow up with a mother, a father and an amazing dad.
When my mother and father divorced, my mother quickly remarried, and I hardly
remember a time when my dad wasn't in my life, which meant his dad was in my
life. Grandpop was from Oklahoma. He wore cowboy boots, bolo ties, and
ten-gallon hats. He had a bit of an accent and always smelled of aftershave.
His first wife died when dad was young so I had never met her. We did know his
second wife, and we called her Grandmom Satterwhite. She was crafty and had a
hair salon in the house. She always wore nylons, had her hair neatly styled,
and wore lipstick. She died suddenly in her sleep from an aneurysm. When we
went to the viewing, Grandpop was not crying, so I did not cry. He was strong,
and I wanted to be strong too, for him. I kept up a strong front, but when we
got in the car for the drive home, I cried. Not just for the loss, but for the
way it seemed to shake Grandpop. He seemed so uncertain of what he was going to
do next. On the way home when I mentioned it to Dad, he said he noticed the
same thing. But, we should not have worried.
He found a new friend at church and in short order they
were planning on getting married, but she died before that was able to happen.
There was no keeping Grandpop down though. He met another friend at church. He
married Johanne when he was 85 and was all smiles the whole day. I remember him
having heart troubles in the late 80's, but had not heard much about those
concerns for some time either because he didn't mention it or because we didn't
ask too many prying questions. He was apparently more sick than we realized.
The last few weeks of his life seem like such a blur; running back and forth
from Lititz to Reading as often as I could to try to keep up with what was
happening. They sent him home at one point, but he was readmitted in short
order with further complications. Once he lost consciousness after his
readmission, he was never fully back. The decision was made to end the heroic
measures keeping him alive, and we all had to stand by and watch him struggle
to breathe while he slowly starved to death. It was agonizing. I cried with
each gasp he took, with each convulsion his body writhed through. I pleaded
with the hospice nurses for something more humane, a better way. One empathized
and said that maybe one day we will give our loved ones the dignity we give our
pets. That really has stuck with me to this day. At the funeral, I was a mess.
I sobbed for the loss, but more because here was a man that accepted me as not
just a step-grandchild, but as a grandchild. He was a grandfather to me because
he wanted to be, not because he had to be. He was buried with his first wife in
the most beautiful cemetery I have ever seen. He is atop a hill overlooking a
lovely wooded area next to the first woman who held his heart.
A few weeks ago it was my dad's birthday. When I called
to wish him a happy day he told me to sit down, he had some news. He said that
my uncle had died earlier that day and no one quite knew how to tell me;
Apparently he had drawn the short straw. I hated my uncle. He was a monster and
even after his death he has continued to haunt me. He did unspeakable things to
me when I was just a small girl. He denies any wrongdoing, I denied him
forgiveness. His death was not a surprise to anyone. He had multiple strokes
over the past few years due in large part to his raging drug addictions. He was
an alcoholic as well and obese. It was bound to all catch up to him. His
funeral was on a Saturday, and while I toyed with going to seek out some sort
of closure, in the end I stayed home. In hindsight, I don't believe being at
the service would have given me any more closure than I have right now. I'm no
longer seeking closure, just some peaceful dreams instead of nightmares.
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