(Eby Granite Works did us proud. The new stone is done by computer etching. To match the other stones would have taken a stone carver four days work. The footing is nice and will last as long as the little town of Shippensburg does. Photo Socotra.)
It beyond weird here this morning. It is the first day of the rest of my life, and I am not quite sure what to do with it.
I swear I will get back to caring about the Greek Debt Crisis, and the leaking of classified information and the financial abyss that is confronting a do-nothing Congress and an apparently can’t-do Administration. That is really important stuff, or so I am told, though I must confess to a certain distraction due to Epiphany (DDTE).
That, of course, is the product of the long voyage with Raven and Big Mama.
Annook and her daughter wore little raven broaches at the Spring Hill Cemetery yesterday in tribute to his memory. I included a pair of his Navy wings in the urn, along with a pair of Big Mama’s earrings. And their Social Security Cards, just in case St. Peter wants to check their eligibility at the resurrection of the flesh.
I was awake around 0300 yesterday. Dim gray pre-dawn arrived presently, and I could not drift back off. There was too much to do. ENS Socotra was coming to pick me up at 0730, and my older son and his lovely fiancé were going to pile in as well.
The remains were in the trunk of the Bluesmobile and needed to be transferred. No remains would mean no burial. Impossible to forget, right? There was more not to space out. The contents of the safe deposit box had been labeled and apportioned according to negotiations. In the background, the affairs of the estate were wrapping themselves up, with some nudging from me in the wheelchair. The probate process had been initiated, and basically closed out. Bequests were paid to the grandchildren. The Broker and his implacable investment company appeared, finally, to be satisfied that Raven and Big Mama were actually dead, and the last recalcitrant insurance company appears to be on the verge of acknowledging the reality of eternity.
So, with that, I wondered whether the last details were going to work. The logistics of the ceremony in Shippensburg suddenly swam into focus in the pre-dawn. Was the headstone really in place? Were there errors in the inscription? Had the gravedigger done his work? Was the hotel acceptable to the family, which was flying in from all points of the compass: Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, Florida, New York, North Carolina, Texas and northern and southern Virginia?
Should I have arranged for a tent, and chairs for the bereaved? Crap. I checked the weather on the iPad in my bed. Brilliant sunshine was the forecast, according to the information on the screen that lit the darkness. We had dodged a bullet there, and I sighed in relief. I should have contacted a local funeral home that does these things, I know, but I took my chances and dealt only with the gravedigger and his father who run Spring Fill. Whew.
Would the reception details be in place? I have rarely felt this helpless to influence events. Cousin Jo Anne sent a fuzzy camera-phone picture of the gathering of the family on the patio of the Shippen Place Hotel the night I was supposed to be there- the Raven and Big Mama sides of the family looking at one another, with one connection between to translate between them.
I felt bad, not being there the evening before, but sometimes things don’t work, and arriving with my sons and the newest prospective member of the Socotra Clan seemed so natural. If the arrangements had worked out, that is, and my stomach knotted at the number of things that could go wrong with the plan, and reflect poorly on the memory of a wonderful couple, the last of their generation, and more particularly, me.
I have talked to the folks, periodically, in the days since the white rectangular boxes arrived in the mail. The mingled remains were then in the urn that rested near the foot of my bed, where I have spent way too much time since returning from the surgeon’s knife 24 days ago.
ENS Socotra showed up right on time, in his Service Dress Blues. I had not asked him to do that, though I recalled vaguely that I had worn the same thing the last visit to the family plot. That occasion was to lay away my Uncle, the patriarch of the family, and the lack of a formal church event was traditional.
The Socotras had been big in the Lutheran Church in the little town since before the Confederates raided the place on their way to Gettysburg. There are still stained glass panels in the church that filter the rich light of the farm country. But Raven never picked up that particular passion, and Big Mama, juggling the Presbyterian-Catholic tumult of her family had no strong preferences in any direction.
We stopped at the hotel and saw the throng of family. That much had worked. I wondered about the rest, and after some general discussion, the plan emerged that most of the family would walk the few blocks to the Spring Hill Cemetery.
There, the plan was to gather under the plinth that carries the granite Muse and her anchor, say a few words, and consign the earthly remains to the ground where all those other Socotras lie. I noticed one had the notation of service in the 55th Pioneer Infantry in the AEF of World War One, and decided to look into it, now that there will be some time.
The family straggled up the hill in a ragged line. The weather was beautiful. The hole was dig. There were no discernable typos on the Pennsylvania granite that will mark their place so long as the adamant gray stone stays intact.
(Family from all the points of the compass. Photo Socotra.)
At precisely 1100, I opened the formal aspect of the ceremony, leani
ng on my crutches. There were remarks by the kids, Then remarks by anyone who cared to, and memories at the foot of the stones that mark the rest of the elder clan.
“Lunch will be served back at the Hotel,” I said in conclusion. “I am proud and humbled at the distance you have all come to be here, and that you have joined to celebrate the lives of our parents.”
Since I can’t walk, my Guardian Ensign drove us back to the hotel with my cousin, who shares Raven’s given name, an honor bestowed by my uncle, even as I was named in return for him. My cousin is a survivor of a horrific cancer that took his larynx and nearly his life, but with an electronic voice box, he announced that he was the only one in the family who traveled with his own public address system.
He has not lost his sense of humor, either.
The reception itself was fine. A little impromptu, but considering it had been done on the phone, I was satisfied. Everyone seemed to get enough to eat, and the conversation, prompted by Annook’s Memory Book of photos and recollection, was lively.
A couple hours into it, people who were driving on to Ohio for the second inurnment at the Catholic side of the bluff-top burying ground began to edge to the door.
I settled up the tab with a large tip, and paid respect to those family headed north and east before the ENS wheeled me to the SUV.
He and his brother loaded the wheelchair and crutches as I leveraged the rigid leg into the car.
He fired up the engine and we wheeled slowly out of the parking log behind the hotel. The family was scattering back to the winds of this century. I am sure I will be back, I thought, and when I can walk I will check the old family store that still stands on Earl Street, and the solid brick exterior of the one-time family seat just up the block.
I waved to my brother, and to his family gathered at their rental car. They would soon head West, toward the big river.
The ENS turned left on the main drag and we started down the road to the Interstate.
“Well,” I said. “That seemed to go pretty well.”
There was no disagreement as the car hit the entrance ramp and we accelerated back to our lives.
I had a couple stiff ones back on the balcony of the unit, when eventually we arrived and the ENS wheeled me upstairs. He took off to get out of his Blues and re-enter his life. I sipped my drink with my shirt off under the last warm rays of the June sun. I listened to the raw joy of the kids splashing in the pool down below.
“Done,” I murmured to no one. “Done.”
(View from the balcony, afternoon of the first day of the rest of everything. Photo Socotra.)
Copyright 2012 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com