let me also preface what you're about to read by saying that, given the morbidity of my recent apocalypse post i am fine. no, really. i actually don't see it as morbidity so much as reality. ok? so email me if you want to, but you don't have to ask me if i'm ok, ok? i'm totally fine.
here we go...
when i started working at the shamrock bar, i knew that i was getting into more than just a weekend job. since i was introduced to the shamrock via my tuesday night summer softball league, i've noticed how tight the people are with eachother there. i wish i had better words to describe the feeling... it really is like family. felicia says it all the time, "you're my family..." ever since i started hanging out with gay people, the word "family" has been used regularly to describe the sort of innate connection that we homos have with each other. but there is something about the shamrock "family" that's even a little bit bigger than that, and i hadn't really gotten my head around it... until yesterday.
for as long as i've been an employee at the shamrock bar, john meyer's health was an issue of concern among the bar staff and the people close to us. john had been diagnosed with brain cancer right around the time i started. i didn't know him or his partner, dana, very well. i knew their faces and we exchanged pleasantries in each passing. this year, when i rode my first act ride, john and dana were right there every day on sweep crew and sleeping in the gym with the rest of us. it wouldn't have taken a genius to tell that john was suffering. and so, by proxy, was dana. i don't know a whole lot about the specifics of john's fight with cancer, but i know that he endured surgery and chemo and countless other torturous things that cancer patients go through. except that he didn't get to live through it. john died last saturday at age 44.
i was notified as soon as i arrived for my shift that night. we happened to be in the midst of a massive party in celebration of felicia's 20th year of employment. but before the night got rolling, she spoke a few tearful words to a packed bar in remembrance of john, and how he had been an important part of her family.
there it was again, "family."
i got the email announcement of the wake and funeral dates and times. i wasn't sure what to do. i had class during the wake, but could have swung the funeral if i hauled ass out of campus after my chemistry exam. i decided not to go, after all, i didn't really know the guy.
last night, toni came home from the wake just as i was getting home from skating practice. she showed me john's memorial thing, the one that's like a program for the funeral. the thing that struck me was that every single one of the pall bearers were shamrock bar employees. see, the way i understand it, the honor of pall bearer is given to the people who were closest in relation to the person being pall-ed. i was conflicted all night, should i go? aren't funerals for people who were super close to the person who died? i hadn't planned on going to the funeral because i wasn't close to john, but was suddenly feeling a weird sort of familial obligation to not only pay my respects, but to be there for those members of my family who were hurting.
a funeral, i have come to understand, isn't just about saying goodbye to someone that you were close to in life, it's also a place for coming together as a family and remembering and grieving and supporting.
a family, i have come to understand, is a group of people whose lives you've permanently touched.
the words, "i love you" i have come to understand, i have mostly taken for granted. someone once told me that if you say it all the time it loses it's meaning. and i used to believe her, but i don't any more because of the way i feel when eric or danno or felicia or anyone tells me any one of fifteen times on a given saturday night that they love me. also, i know that i mean it every single time i say it. to anyone. a hundred times, or just once.
i need to tell people that i love them more.
i wish i had rescheduled my exam so that i could have attended john's funeral. instead, i wore my dress blacks to campus in respect. when people asked, i told them that there was a family funeral that i wasn't able to attend.
so that's the back story. i hope that i was able to convey at least a half of what i'm feeling. in any case, here's the part that you need to not freak out about:
i'm going to write a will. here. not right at this moment, because i need some more time to think everything through. i just think that paying a lawyer is stupid, and nobody that i know and love would be such an asshole, even in the event of my untimely death, as to disregard the words that i am writing while i am of relatively sound mind and judgment. any one of us could die at any moment, i just want to have a say in how things go down after i do.
first: my funeral will be held in madison. this stipulation could change as my geographical location does, but as of now, it's gonna be madison. i've got more family here than i do anywhere else, and it is important to me that my families meet. i hope that it can happen before i die, but if it doesn't, i want my funeral to be like the first meeting of two biological siblings who've never met. plus, the turnout will be bigger if it's in madison. what happens to me after the funeral is up to my parents. sorry guys. i like the idea of having a huge drunken parade around the capitol and then putting my body, wrapped up in linen, on a wooden raft on lake monona and set on fire. i don't think that's actually legal. you guys should still have a huge drunken party, though.
second: pall bearers. personally, i don't think that anyone should feel either obligated to or not worthy of the task, so here's how it should be done: form two lines, everyone who wants to do it, the line should be as long or as short as it needs to be, stand shoulder to shoulder to shoulder so that you're facing eachother and just pass that box on down the line. you will be awarded bonus points if you can get the casket moved crowd surf style. also, if you can make a hearse that gets pulled by at least four bicycles, you get extra bonus points. the funeral parade should consist of as many hockey sticks, bicycles, and motorcycles as possible.
seriously.
i am so not going through the whole death ordeal just to get carted to my final resting place in one of those awful lincoln minivan looking things with the terrible gold trim.
my love to john.
Now that you have brought it up, I heard it tonight at dinner after hockey. I was sharing my "Oprah moment" with some folks and Gerry said "we are your family now" and it struck me again. He was right!
Posted by: jenn | September 30, 2007 at 20:16