The Aftermath

A death in the family is a shock to all concerned whether it is expected or not.
Most of the next days are a blur for me. I remember some things and other things were shared with me by family members.

I was so afraid Mom would want to have Daddy's body at home. However, she did not and I was so thankful she didn't.

Our next door neighbor lady was among the first to stop by. Others came including some of my classmates. I was saddened later when I overheard one of my classmates telling another that she "was the first one who had come to see me."

I was insistent that I was not going to the mortuary to "view the body." My brothers were equally insistent that I would do this. Of course, there were three of them and they were bigger than I so I went. "The body" was in a burgundy robe - my Daddy did not own a burgundy robe! I think probably "the body" wasn't really ready for "viewing."

A fly lit on Daddy's ear - and I knew he could not ever brush away a fly again. that is when I walked out.

Inez, my sister-in-law, tells me the funeral was on a misty, rainy, gray day. I do not remember this at all.

Sometime before the funeral, Daddy's brother Claude arrived. I heard his voice when he came in the back door. He sounded just like Daddy. He looked so much like Daddy only he was slighter in build. It was good that he was there.

The morning of the funeral, September 13, brother Bill and I were in the chapel look at all the flower arrangements that were placed at the end of each pew. He read one card and I would read the next. I got along just fine until I read the card from the sophomore class, my class. Then I started to cry. That was the end of reading the cards on the flowers.

Later our family was seated in a side room. I could look out the open front door. I was quite surprised to see Don and his friend Duane walk up the front steps. I guess I didn't even think about classmates and school friends coming to the funeral.

A men's quartet sang. My band director played "Taps" at the cemetery. He missed the last high note. When I said something to him about it later, I think I made him feel bad. It was one of the things that I have always remembered.

Our preacher was a man who immigrated to the US from Holland after WWII and he had quite an accent. He was a very nice, caring man.

The chapel at the mortuary was full. Daddy knew so many people from his job in the post office and I think most people liked him.

I know my mother grieved. No one told me it was important to grieve any loss, whether it would be putting away a teddy bear because one was too old to carry around a bear any longer or the loss of someone we loved. So I didn't know how to grieve.

A dear friend asked me many years later why I never talked about my Dad. I told her there was nothing to talk about because he was dead.

Forty years later I did my grieving, sitting in a chair in the Ness City Cemetery, writing a dialog with my Dad. There were about a dozen pages of writing. Grief is hard work but it is necessary so a person can get back to living life.