I don’t suppose we’ll hear from the teenage tourists again until they reach Managua on Thursday.
This follows ìMore Than a Phone Callî , and I donÃt think it stands alone. ItÃs a phone call I had with my mother about the funeral for the husband of my motherÃs friend who shot himself in his living room.
ìYou went to the service for AliceÃs husbandî?
ìWe did. It was a beautiful day, seven oÃclock in the evening. Not even hot, no hotter than eighty.
ìWhere was he buried?î
ìThe cemetery on Oak Hill Road. ItÃs out 41, on a hill near Whirlpool?î
ìThere are no hills near Whirlpool. it must have been past the airport.î
My mother loves it when I tell her sheÃs mistaken about something she knows is true. I think we might have been arguing perceptions.
Patiently, she answered, ìIf you turn right near Whirlpool you go up a hill.î
ìWhirlpool is as flat as the nearby airport runway… .î
ìThere were about twenty-five people. The cemetery had only markers, no upright stones, and it was touching to see the children and grandchildren running about, playing. Although my father wouldnÃt have allowed it. He said stepping on graves was disrespectful. Alice was wearing a black pantÃs suit she bought for the service. She weighs eighty-four pounds and her fitter said she was a size zero. I didnÃt know there was such a thing.î
ìEighty-four pounds. How tall is she?î
ìNot much taller than I, but she started losing weight when George got cancer.î
ìA woman who scrubs the blood of her husband off her carpets. I donÃt know…I pictured someone bigger. How about Lisa, the daughter he was so close to?î
ìShe was still pretty tore up.î
My precise mother never says ìtore up,î and sheÃs probably cringing reading this, but itÃs more evocative than ìtorn up.î She said it this time, so it stays.
ìLisa came with her husband and children. You know I always thought she had gay tendencies, but thatÃs because she had so closely imitated her fatherÃs mannerisms. She walks like he did.î
ìNot to be morbid, but you saw them lower his body into the grave?î
ìNo, no, he was cremated. They buried his urn next to his daughterÃs grave, or they sprinkled his ashes on it. I couldnÃt tell from where I sat. You remember that is what they did with MackÃs sister, Joan. Her ashes were placed in the ground next to her motherÃs. I donÃt know what people will do with me. Not that they will listen to what I want.î
Years ago, not long after her brother died, my mother and I argued about her burial. She wants to be cremated and her ashes flung out to sea, or buried in a garden, or enriched with an emulsion of sunflower seeds and fed to the cardinals – anything but a body in a grave. ItÃs not lying in dirt, itÃs the waste of space, of her burden on the environment. I was adamant. I wanted her in the ground, somewhere I could go and talk to her. I didnÃt want to be following some nesting song bird just just to say, ìHi.î It wasnÃt too long after this conversation that I decided chasing birds wasnÃt so bad.
ìWe listen, you know we do. WeÃll do what you want.î
ìJust be sure you play a recording of Tess (BrianÃs wife) on the Tabla Drums. ItÃs hard to get people to do what you want. Alice couldnÃt get the minister she wanted for the funeral. You know, they werenÃt church going people. But she has iron up her back, she told me, ë WeÃre just going to have to do it ourselves.à ì
