Funeral

Today was the funeral for my sister. It was sadder than I'd expected, since the viewing yesterday at the funeral home was healing and a comforting time of sitting around together on pretty furniture with a great view of autumn color.
It surprised me, to arrive at the church and burst into tears, I thought I had it all together, but there seems to be no end to them. I really hated to see the new, dark hair on Becky's head disappear from sight when they closed the casket
I keep thinking of all the humor someone, some sit-com writer, could find in me and my grieving family. The one who won't sit still, the one who takes pictures of every single moment, the one who glares at the priest. It doesn't sound funny, but there was a lot of humor as we resigned ourselves to being where we didn't want to be. I guess that's good, isn't it, to step back a bit to see how we are together, to see humor in the tragedy of losing a loved one.
Becky's son arranged the funeral, from out of state, to suit his wishes. He wanted a traditional Latin funeral mass and to sing in the choir. Both things happened, but without enough preparation, and not without quite a bit of bewilderment on the part of the mourners, the altar boys, and the priest. Then we buried Becky next to our parents in a small cemetery just south of Monmouth on top of a hill looking over Willamette Valley farmland. From there we went back to my brother's home in West Salem, to spend the rest of the day together.