So after Tiffany left, later Mitch came over. He was talking a lot about Mozilla. I thought it was a religious discussion, but it turned out he’s got some startup idea that’s going to use esperanto. I say, “yay.” We went out to pizza. We came back and Christi’s Mother and Brother arrived. We sat around and talked, then went to bed. (aren’t blogs exciting?)
This morning I woke up and Tiffany was back here. yay. I thanked her for doing my half of the chores. Then she left and the Dentons and I drove to San Jose to get Christi’s Father from the SJ Airport. We went to my dad’s house to change. It’s full of flowers. I haven’t yet collected cards to write thank you notes. My dad showed up, so we went to Kim’s Vietnamese food with him. The organist called my cell phone and I finally gave her the list of hymns. Then we went to the rosary. We only said a decade of the rosary. Monsegnour Milani read a few readings and did a short, vague homily. Then it was over. Bang, bang, done. My mom would have been disappointed. But the crowd was pretty good. Christi made the book thingee. It’s beautiful. It’s covered with handmade (not by her) paper with rosebuds embedded in it. A lot of people came. The first guy I talked to was upset that we had communicated insufficieantly with him and was mad about it. And then some other guy came by and complained at my dad for being insufficiently sociable. Um yeah. Next time she dies, we’ll handle it better. The criticizm was very mild, but when you’re already fighting back tears, it stings more than normal.
A certain gentleman who is socially awkward came over to say goodbye. I thanked him for coming, so he said, “well thank you for being born.” I replied, “anytime.” Brother Bob guffawed. It was the only comic moment. In case I haven’t been clear on this, my mom dying sucks. My mom always liked the unnamed gentleman. She was always willing to overlook people’s foibles. She would give anybody on earth a second chance. Unless someone hurt someone she cared about. Then she never forgave, ever.
My mother’s mother died nine years ago. While she was ill, before her death, she had a nurse named Beatrice. Beatrice read about my mom in the paper and showed up to her rosary. She said my mom was always her friend. So if you helped someone my mom cared about, she didn’t forget you then either.
after the mortuary asked us to leave so they could close up, we went to La Teejo de Lusi. We stayed forty minutes past closing, but they never asked us to leave. I think we made tea orders after they closed, and they filled them without saying anything. Only Sarah K clued us in to their closing. They’re much nicer than the mortuary. It’s too bad they don’t do wakes there. The mortician at the rosary looked like he has the ability to turn into a bat. But the mortuary chapel has a huge crucifix, so he must not actually be a vampire. Anyway, we were at Lucy’s with the Dentons, the Sarahs, Mitch, Vince and Tammy. Vince and Tammy didn’t go to the rosary because Vince’s mom told them that Vince’s dad needed an emergency angioplasty and was at death’s door, but apparently, she overstated the crisis. I’m glad he’s ok.
We came home and did trash night things. I lit candle number three. The BVM and John the Baptist already burned out, but they were pretty low when they came here. Aside from the BVM (it seemed right to start with her), all of the remaining candles are ordered by amount of wax left, so all things being equal, they should burn longer and longer with each candle. And I fixed the heater. The fan had been failing to come on when the heater got hot, so instead of being like a regular, mordern heater, it was more like a radiator and utterly innefective at dispersing heat over our upstairs, which has very high ceilings. anyway, I opened the heater cover and switched a button marked “fan” to to “on.” I’m leading people to beleive that it was actually a technical repair, so keep this quiet.
It’s so weird having family gatherings without my mom. It’s not right at all