There were 13 people there Sunday at noon. That was more than enough.
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It looked like there were two rooms to go through. I didn't know which was which. So as my parents went through the left opening, the one on the far end, the one with the chairs, I decided to see if it may have been on the right, closer one, the one with all dining tables were.
Turns out both openings connect to the same room. I went through the wrong one, however. I was looking straight ahead to a pair of empty easels. But then I looked to the left and saw around a post.
There my uncle was. "Oh my God," I said to myself.
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I got up close. His arms folded in front of him, and they have him one of those trademark plaid button-down shirts that he always wore. My uncle may have looked a little more pale than the last time I saw him, but surprisingly, he mostly looked just like he did in the care facility -- wan and thin, weight loss sucking out the protrusion of his chin, thinning hair slicked back, and his eyes closed. But at least his pose had changed; instead of being confined to a bed and curled up so that his left arm was permanently at his side, it seems to be a relief to stretch out, even if it is to lie perfectly straight. And, of course, despite the fact that it was the morticians who put the body in that position.
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I'm glad that most of the family there dressed up for the occasion. Kind of disappointed that my uncle showed up in a hat, jeans and sneakers. He has a suit, doesn't he?
Not like I was dressed to the nines. Wore my brown shoes, the left one with a stain from butter-flavored topping that plopped onto it while I was at the movies a long, long time ago. Everyone else wore black shoes; maybe I should have done the same, but the only ones I had either were kind of busted or were missing shoelaces.
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We only had an hour. At first I thought it was pretty disrespectful for uncle to only have one hour. But after the baker's dozen of us sat there in silence, the seconds ticking by, the grandfather clock chiming that ... chiming thing clocks do every 15 minutes (just looked it up on Wikipedia -- that chime has a name: "Westminster Quarters"), maybe one hour was more than adequate. It felt like we were all relieved after our hour was "up."
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I can tell you who wasn't quiet: My aunt. Shit, she was fucking crazy Sunday. Well, all the adult figures there are crazy. But somehow in social occasions my aunt absolutely loses her fucking mind. And even considering the circumstances, she made herself look like a fool.
When my grandmother died in 1985, her funeral was traditional. We were dressed up in these special white robes (remember that in the Far East white, not black, is the color of death) and told to pray a lot. And there was a Vietnamese guy who lived in the same dorm as I who died when I was in college. When we attended his service, his brothers, dressed nicely in Western clothes, laid vigil at his side (although he was sitting in chairs). If we approached him, his bros helped light incense for us.
What I'm trying to say is that of the Asian funerals I have attended, there has been some honoring of tradition. I hadn't thought about what we would do if, Buddha forbid, our folks died. Why would we think about it? It's death, and it sucks to think about death. In my uncle's case, all there was were flowers bought by the oldest child's girlfriend/wife. No incense, no chanting, no robes, no vigil (his kids actually got there after us; my parents and I were the first ones inside), and since Uncle was going to be cremated, he was not displayed in a coffin but on a table -- well, more like a gurney, with the dull chrome struts and grocery cart-style wheels I couldn't help but notice as we just sat there.
There should be someone who knows how our funeral services are supposed to be done. My aunt does; unfortunately, she became a fucking nag about it. First, she couldn't stop leaning onto the chair in front of her, my chair, to talk to Mother, whom I was sitting next to. I didn't understand what she was talking about, but with her voice, she wasn't approving of something.
But then she bolted up, went over to Uncle's two kids (he has three, but the one I met at Uncle's side a few days ago for the first time in years wasn't there because, according to his girlfriend/wife, he already mourned -- bullshit if you ask me), and ordered them to kneel at their father's side. My aunt is really bossy, and she has no problems physically taking you to do something if she wants you to do something.
And that, shamefully, she did, grabbing both my cousins and forcing them to pay proper respect to their dead father. The middle one -- she's crazy and virtually estranged from the family -- couldn't move because she just got out of surgery. My aunt didn't know that, so she pleaded with her not to touch her to the point of tears. But the youngest, he did what his aunt told her to do, even though there wasn't a pad or pillow from which to soften his knees. And he looked around with a face that either said, "Um, is this what I'm supposed to do?" or "Oh my fucking God, this is what I'm supposed to do?!" But there he stayed, timidly.
I understand tradition. But if I'm going to pray in front of my folks, I'll do it in private. Besides, give the kids some dignity, all this shit happened in four days. They might not be sufficiently mournful, but what my aunt did in front of all of us, and in particular what he did to my cousins, was downright embarrassing.
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When the hour was up and we starting to hug each other and leave, we bade farewell to Uncle one last time. I went up, put my hands together and prayed (something simple like that I have no problem with) and said goodbye, on behalf of both my sister and I.
What I wanted to do was hold him one last time. I wonder what he would feel like. In particular I would've touch his wrist, where you feel your pulse. I know I wouldn't feel anything. And to think just four days before, I felt a pulse -- beating like it's trying to keep its head above water, but beating, alive. Now it was probably gone, but ... I don't know, I wanted to feel that. That no one else touched him prevented me from doing so, stopped me from holding my Uncle one last time.
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By the way, only my cousin, the female one, the one who got out of surgery, cried over Uncle. We Chinese don't cry. We never do.
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The cremation was today. Could have happened already or it could be happening later, or it might be happening as I type this. His urn will be housed in the same cemetery where my Grandmother is resting.
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