The snow was not predicted so when we awoke to Darcy and Dakota running around the house screaming, “It’s snowing, it’s snowing,” we were surprised. I was more surprised to see how excited they were about snow since they live in Denver.
Jessie was already in the kitchen making coffee and getting the boys breakfast. “So you guys don’t get snow in Denver?” I said sarcastically.
“Funny. We just haven’t had a whole lot this year.”
“They weren’t calling for this, although February is our prime time for snow. What time is the funeral?” I asked.
“Noon,” Jessie answered.
“Did you check the weather yet?”
“I did,” Aunt Deb was standing in front of the doorway. “Looks like we’re going to get four inches; no big deal; they’ll have this cleaned up in no time.”
Dad and Sharon sauntered in. Sharon was still in p.j.’s with hearts all over them.
“Celebrating Valentines already?” I asked. “Isn’t a little early for that, we still have a few weeks?”
“I like hearts,” Darcy said munching on his Ego waffle.
“Me too,” Dad said wrapping his arms around Sharon.
“I get first dibs on the shower,” Jessie said.
“No let me go,” I said, “then I can keep on eye on my two nephews.” I winked at the two of them. Darcy smiled, Dakota stuck out his tongue. Perfect I thought.
I took Jessie in my car with the two kids. I was happy not to have Dad and Sharon tagging along. I could not take one more question from her. How was my job, how did I like my apartment, why wasn’t I dating anyone, did I like living in Pennsylvania, on and on. As soon as I answered one question she was firing another. I wanted to ask her; hey did you know my mom just died of cancer two years ago?
My sister was like a mind reader sometimes. I was being too quiet when she asked, “So what do you think of Sharon?” I knew she was being facetious.
“You know exactly what I think of her.”
“I know you don’t like anyone that Dad dates. Remember the last one? You nick- named her Tweety bird because she had really short, blonde, spiky hair.”
“Oh yeah, Dad met her on one of those online dating services,” I laughed.
“Don’t knock it until you try it. My friend Jill just got divorced last year and she swears she has found her soul mate on Match.”
“I’m glad I have four- wheel drive on this thing, the snow is still coming down, and it looks like more than four inches to me.”
“Did you like the dessert that Aunt Deb made last night?”
“How can you think of food now Jessie?”
“Those lemon cookies were Grandma’s recipe. It made me think of the time when we spent the night with her; you were like nine and I was around eleven. Remember we ate an entire tin of those cookies and then you puked? We tried to hide it because Grandma was in a bad mood and she busted in the bathroom anyway when we told her to go away?”
“Yeah, I remember. Do you remember what she said?”
“I’ll never forget it.”
“She goes, ‘That’s what you get when you make a glutton of yourself.’”
“Yeah and then she told us to clean up after ourselves. She went to bed after that because I was trying to get some Ginger ale or Sprite for you and she wouldn’t answer her door.”
“What was she so mad about anyway?”
“I don’t know but the next day she threw the garbage can from the bathroom up the stairs at me,” Jessie said.
“What?” I asked.
“She didn’t say anything but she looked at me from the bottom of the stairs and then she threw the little garbage can from the hall bathroom up the stairs at me and walked away.”
“What was that all about?”
“I guess she wanted me to empty the garbage or at least put the can back for her.”
“Can you say weird? Can you say anger management?” I said laughing.
“I know she had her ups and downs you could say. She could be sweet when she wanted to be. I think she was angry with Uncle Russell all the time. Dad said that it was good that he was there with her but I wonder.”
“I’ve gotta pee,” Darcy said from the backseat.
“Okay, we’re almost there kiddo.”
The funeral was at St. Joe’s church in Mechanicsburg, which I didn’t quite get until I asked my dad about it. There were plenty of Catholic churches closer to Aunt Deb’s house. Dad explained last night in between courses that Grandma had banned the other Catholic Church, St. Michael’s, which was much closer, because she had had a falling out with the priest there. He wasn’t ordained before Vatican Two Dad explained and she had too many problems with modern day priests.
I recalled another memory of my grandmother making a bee- line directly to the priest at our church. She caused the line to get totally screwed up for communion because she would not take communion from a Eucharistic minister, who was a woman. Grandma believed that there was no room for women on the altar.
As I drove towards the church I realized how hard it had begun to snow and I was worried about the roads. Our brilliant weather guy, Steve Austin, did not predict the snow. I dropped off Jessie and the boys at the door. “I’ll be right in. I’m going to park,” I said. I secretly wanted a minute to collect my thoughts before going into to Mass.
I turned on the radio for a second to see if I could hear anything more about the weather. The man said that this wasn’t predicted but the weather pattern had changed and there was a storm coming up from the South and we could accumulate up to six inches. The ground was covered and it was still coming down. I wondered when it would stop. I took a flask out of my purse and took a big sip. The peppermint Schnapps burned my throat. It was only ten forty five in the morning but I figured it was five o’clock somewhere and I needed to take the edge off. I locked up the Subaru and went inside.
St. Joe’s was built in the early 1950’s but they have had many changes and renovations since then. The church is modern now with a large school attached. The big claim to fame with this church is the replica of the San Damiano Crucifix. The original hung in a chapel in San Damiano Northern Italy. Francis Bernadone came to pray in that church and the story is that he heard a voice from that crucifix that instructed him to repair the little church. He had found his vocation and he had begun to be St. Francis of Assisi. The replica of this crucifix now hangs over the altar. The only reason I know this is because one of the few times I stayed overnight with my grandma she made us go to church here and we had to go to the children’s mass where they explained this to us; for some reason I always remembered it.
As I entered church my dad was standing in the back talking to the priest. I heard dad say, “What happened Father? We were supposed to have Father Walton.”
I recognized Father O’Connor, the younger of the two priests in the parish, talking to Dad. Then I heard Father O’Connor say, “It seems your mother was quite spirited. She had told Father Walton to go to hell at her last reconciliation. Father sent me. He said it would be best.”
Figures, Grandma even ticked off the very priest she was supposed to have at her own funeral! I couldn’t wait to tell Jessie that one. I gave Dad a small smile and he motioned for me to go in; which I gladly did. I could tell poor Father O’Connor was uncomfortable.
The church was intimate and in a semi circular shape so you can see the whole congregation from wherever you are seated. The altar is pretty without being overdone or pretentious. I found Jessie and the boys up front. Aunt Deb and Uncle Jack sat in the pew behind them. The church probably would hold around one thousand or so parishioners but I was astonished at how empty the church was. The service was supposed to start at 12:00, in less than fifteen minutes, and there were only around twenty people here. Half of the twenty were family, so where the hell was everybody, I wondered?
“Aunt Rachel?” Darcy was pulling on my sweater.
“What babe?” I answered.
“You smell like peppermint. Mommy, Aunt Rach smells like peppermint candy.”
“Give him a mint.”
“I don’t have any,” I whispered. My sister raised her eyebrow at me. “If you want to meet me in the bathroom…”
“What are you talking about?”
I flashed my flask in my purse.
“You are unbelievable. Actually that was kinda smart.”
“Where is everyone?”
“You know Grandma. She had a beef with everyone in town. She even managed to tick off her best friend Mary- Grace. Poor Mary-Grace has cancer and she told her to toughen up and get a life recently.”
“How do you know that?”
“Dad told me earlier when I asked where she was today. Dad just said that Mary is still kind of mad at Grandma for giving her such a hard time when she was going through chemo and she didn’t know if she’d make the Mass today.”
“Whoa.”
Father O’Connor made his way to the altar and the music started. “Please rise for the Opening Hymn, Jesus Christ is Risen Today,” she said. The woman leading the singing today had been the choir director at this church for years. I remembered her from when I was little. The opening prayer was from Ecclesiastes 3:1-11: “There is a time for everything and a season for every activity under heaven; a time to be born and a time to die… The word of the Lord,” said Father O’Connor.
“Thanks be to God,” we chimed. You could tell who was not Catholic as those people stood not knowing what to say.
I just kept thinking of the song by the Byrds, Turn, Turn, Turn, and what a rip off it was from this bible verse. I wondered how many people knew that the pop hit was based on Ecclesiastes. I couldn’t focus to hear what Father was saying and I guess I started to hum because Jessie gave me the mommy look again. Dad and Sharon who sat at the opposite end of the pew were now looking at me.
“What?” I whispered to Jessie.
“You are humming that old song by the Byrds.”
“Sorry,” I said. Darcy who sat next to me grabbed my hand to hold. Leave it to him to find a caring moment. He did have his sensitive side. I smiled at him.
“It’s okay Aunt Rachel,” he said.
I finally focused in as Father was saying that while life lessons are important, the life after we leave Earth is much more important, and although our loss is hard, the important thing to remember is that with death we are reborn and joined with Christ. As I sat thinking about this statement I realized that maybe that was why Grandma was so mean. She didn’t care what was going on here as long as she got to heaven. I guess that’s why she was always so concerned with getting to Mass.
My mind drifted back to one of the times Jessie and I had come to Mass with Grandma. Everyone was in a rush to get out once Mass had ended. The parking lot turned into a mini Indy Car Race as everyone juxtaposition to be the first car out. Grandma had rammed into her neighbor’s brand new Volvo that morning and cursed the whole way home. I remember asking her why she was in such a hurry to get to church but even in more of a hurry to get out of church. She simply said, “I’ve gotta get dinner on.” That was one thing about Grandma; she was always cooking.
Then suddenly from the back of the church there was loud screaming. Dad’s Aunt Ellen stood in the back of the church scolding her daughter Lucy. Lucy was born with Down syndrome. “What the hell are you doing?” she yelled at Lucy. Lucy was standing there looking like she’d lost her best friend. Dad looked mortified. This was typical Aunt Ellen, she never entered anywhere unnoticed.
Father was about to finish his Homily and have the family come up to say a few words about Grandma. He looked to the back of the church. “Everything alright?” he said.
Aunt Ellen yanked Lucy into the main part of the church and sat in the back. “Oh, nothing Father,” she said.
Father looked horrified and cleared his throat and said, “Some of the family and friends gathered here today have prepared a few words about their beloved mother and friend. I believe Debra would like to speak first.”
“Ann Castellato was a complicated woman. She was often misunderstood. As her daughter I knew just how complicated she was. We had a typical mother-daughter relationship. She was always right and I was always wrong…”
I nudged Jessie and said, “This is not exactly how I would want to be remembered.”
“Aunt Deb is starting out a little rough.”
The congregation was stirring and there was a little laughter from Aunt Debs’s description of her relationship with Grandma. I looked behind me to see a few more people in church than when Mass had started and I even saw Mary-Grace; she had shown up after all.
Aunt Deb continued on saying that Grandma was a challenging person. I kept wondering when we were going to hear about what a kind hearted woman she was or some kind of charity work she had done, but Deb was stretching. It was a brutal eulogy finally ending with her saying, “And so no one is perfect, especially my mother, but at least she is in a better place now and hopefully happy.”
“Remind me to hire a different speech writer if Aunt Deb is going to speak at my funeral,” I said whispering to Jessie.
“I was thinking the same thing. She really didn’t have one positive thing to say about Grandma.”
More of our family went up to eulogize our grandmother and it was much the same as Aunt Debra. No one had any one thing to say that was memorable or even portraying Grandma as someone other than a jerk. I knew she was difficult but this was unbelievable.
Then from the back of the church, a Mail Carrier, still in his uniform, came up to speak. “Hello. My name is George and I was Ann’s Mailman for the last twenty years. Ann rarely ever talked to me…”
Jessie and I looked at each other and I could only hold my head. I hoped this eulogy from the mail carrier wouldn’t be a brutal as the rest had been.
He continued, “But each year at Christmas she would always have something for me out in the mailbox. Many of the people in her neighborhood would leave me hot cocoa or cookies or candy but Ann always left me something special. This past year there was a note in the mailbox in her perfect handwriting that read, for George, good for one dinner at my home, Merry Christmas.”
All I could think of was the fact that Grandma did nothing but complain about the mailman. She would say, “That bastard can’t even bring my packages to the door. He leaves them out in the driveway for me. Doesn’t he know that an old woman lives here...?”
One year after a bad snow storm he left her a diagram in the mailbox of how to shovel around the mailbox so he wouldn’t have to get out of his mail truck to deliver. I elbowed Jessie again, “Are you listening to this?”
“This takes the cake,” she said.
He continued, “I went to the door that day to redeem her offer and she stood smiling. I really didn’t believe it but when I showed her the note she insisted I come on Christmas Eve. Somehow she knew that my wife had recently passed away and that I was on my own. She made a dinner fit for a king; a standing rib roast, home made potatoes, fresh horseradish sauce, cranberry relish from scratch, brussel sprouts and bread she had baked that morning. It was the nicest thing anyone had done for me since my wife had passed away…”
I drifted off while he continued wondering what provoked Grandma to do this. I wondered where Uncle Russell was on Christmas Eve. While I was happy someone had something nice to say my emotions were raw. George the mailman was the only person whose eulogy portrayed my grandmother as slightly human.
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