Dad

Today is Columbus Day. Well actually it’s not Columbus Day but our government, in its infinite wisdom has decided to celebrate Columbus Day today. Normally I don’t let these little government idiosyncrasies bother me, but this one hits a little closer to home. No my family is not descended from the blood line of Christopher Columbus however, 22 years ago on the 12th of October, my father left this life for whatever comes next and in my mind that action forever connected the two.

How am I going to go out and have a memorial beer on the 9th of October? He’s only 21 years 11 months and 28 days gone, not 22 years. It just doesn’t seem right somehow. Actually, in my case it doesn’t make a lot of difference, as I don’t have to work on the twelfth either.

So I’m planning a memorial lunch at someplace dad would like. Someplace a little dark that serves beer and maybe has bowls of peanuts on the tables. With middle-aged waitresses that Pop could have flirted with and some sort of salty burnt meat for lunch. It will be a place where they won’t notice or mind my carrying on a conversation with Ray’s ashes or that his container is sitting on the table. I gotta take Ray, Sam was his father too, and it’s only right that he attends.

It’s settled, Thursday, October 12th, The Sam Cramer Memorial Lunch.

Uncle Dave

Picasso

On the morning of her 50th birthday she got up from bed with a thousand different things on her mind. Her husband was already up and gone to work where she suspected he was using at least half his valuable time working on the surprise party she knew he’d been planning for weeks. She takes her shower and sits at the dressing table putting on her face.

After dressing and primping she steps out into the hallway to start the new day. Turning to take that one last inspecting look in her favorite mirror that hangs next to the bedroom door she stiffens and falls to the floor dead from a massive heart attack. The maid hears her fall and quickly takes appropriate action.

Later at his office there was a phone call that brought him to the emergency room where he stood helplessly by while the doctors did all they could to bring back the body that was far past their ability to help. In the numbness of shock he went home to find there in the hallway outside his bedroom door the remains of the machinations performed by the paramedics who also tried to save his wife. After staring at the discarded EKG pads, her shoes and clothing left behind there, he turns and sees there on the wall beside him the new Picasso he bought for her birthday and again wonders why she loved it so. To him it looked rather gruesome. It was of a very striking woman with a bent nose and eyes on different planes. It was not at all the sort of thing he would want to see just before bedtime or first thing in the morning. It’s only saving grace in his mind was that it enabled him to discard that gaudy old mirror. He realized now that the picture would have to go, as she who loved it so much would not be here to appreciate it.

At the funeral none among them knew her epitaph should have read, "Were she a fan of Monet she would still be with us."

Uncle Dave (Having a strange day.)