Well, we had the memorial Monday evening. Mom couldn't bring herself to let his ashes go, so we buried them in her backyard and planted a grapefruit tree over them . . . she had just got back home from the care center that morning, so it was a long, hard day for all concerned. We had a family dinner, with his daughter in from Montana and my older sister down from DFW.
Mom decided to plant my father's ashes with him---he's been on the credenza in the dining room for like ten years now---so that was good. And Tim will have our father to keep him company, and together they'll bless the tree and bear fruit to gift us all in their memory. I'm relieved, because Mom's been talking crap about Dad in front of his ashes for ten years now!
Pretty sad. Everyone's trying to say something nice, and they all have to reach back to when Tim was a kid to find a good memory of him, before the alcohol took him, to share. I don't even have those, really---when I was a kid he was a bully, and when we met up again he was a drunk---but you know, it leaves a hole in the world when someone passes, and it doesn't really matter what kind of person used to fill that hole, it's still a damn hole. He was a degenerate alcoholic who drank himself out of a career, a family, a house and home, life itself . . . but he was still my brother. The shieldwall of the kinclan is one more less for his passing, and we shall miss his sword arm in the battles to come. Sad.
Thanks again for the thoughts, the prayers, and all the kind words. With Dad to watch over him, I do hope he rests in peace.
~Boar