My mom invited me over to her place for dinner on Friday. On my way there, it started to snow, but the roads were still pretty good. My mom made us huge, spinach salads with croutons, cheese and real bacon bits sprinkled on top. It was really good. We hung out for a bit, watched “Seinfeld” and then it was time for me to head home. The streets that had been great were now covered in snow. Ugh. Long story short, I skidded and fishtailed my way home safely.
I had to go to a funeral on Saturday, my brother’s father-in-law died late last week. Instead of worrying about how bad the streets were going to be on the way there, I made a decision to call a cab. I do not regret that decision, I was relieved that I would be able to make it to the service. The other streets were actually much better than the ones near me, but I had no way of knowing it until I was on my way in the cab.
The funeral service was nice. The father-in-law was laid out in a casket in the front of the room. At the end of the service they had us go up, one row at a time, and pay our last respects to him. I’m not comfortable with viewing someone in a casket. So instead I greeted my family and the father-in-law’s girlfriend. I had been able to keep my emotions in check throughout the service, but when I saw tears streaming down my nephew’s face, I had to fight back my own.
The next step was to proceed to the cemetery and the mausoleum. I had never been to a mausoleum before and pictured an old, gothic-style tomb made with moss-covered stones, ancient cobwebs in every corner. I think I’ve seen too many horror movies. Instead, we were led into a very pretty building. Each wall was lined with marble plaques with engraved names. A fountain was in the middle of the room. Someone gave us all a carnation so that we could place them on the casket. The area where the casket was going to go had a little curtain in front of it. Kids kept going up and peeking behind the curtain. My sister-in-law joked that it looked like someone was going to put on a puppet show. What would we do without our sense of humor? We’d all be a mess.
Anyway, we went to lunch afterward, an Italian restaurant set up a buffet for us. It was really good food. Then we dispersed and my brother told my nephew to drive me home.
So that drive home…wow. It could’ve been so easy, but we didn’t realize that there are two roads of the same name in that particular city. One leads back to my town, the other…..doesn’t. I figured all roads would lead us at least closer to my town, so we went down the other road and wound up in a totally different town. My nephew freaked a bit, but we eventually headed back in the right direction. When I finally figured out which direction to go, I told my nephew and his girlfriend snapped at me and said they weren’t going to take anymore “retarded” directions. But thankfully my nephew defended me a little and, after getting his car stuck in some snow, and hearing a stream of swear words flow out of my nephew’s mouth that I had never heard him say before, we followed my directions that led us to my place. It was so nice, again, to see my apartment. To think, if I had driven myself to the funeral, I would’ve missed that magical, scenic trip on the way back! It was a pretty day, though, the sun came out and that made things much more bearable.
Here’s another drawing for you:
Eclectic Spaghetti 