Sad memories come with humor

The sky was as grey as my mood.

The other day I was going through some of the stuff from Mom’s funeral that was held three years ago. I was searching for any genealogy information that I didn’t already have. Imagine my surprise when I read that her funeral occurred a full year before she died. I don’t remember being invited to that one.

The little pamphlets that were handed out at her funeral stated clearly that her services had been the year before. Obviously I didn’t proofread the copy beforehand, and neither did anyone else. Thankfully, the people who mattered showed up on the correct date.

That error reminded me of my in-laws’ graves. My mother-in-law died first. She was a beautiful lady and her husband chose a beautiful stone. Since he was intending on donating his body to science, he only bought one funeral plot.

Fast forward to his death. I am not sure if he changed his mind about donating his body or if his family did. At any rate, he was buried close to his wife. A young man that they didn’t know was buried between them. The family honored his request to not put a death date on his stone. He wanted someone to walk through the cemetery, stop at his grave and think, “Wow. That guy is really old!”

I kept leafing through the past. I found several newsletters from Delco. That is where my grandfather had worked. 

Company newsletters seem to be extinct. These had been saved because somewhere inside was a small note that my grandfather had won a whopping $2 for submitting a suggestion that saved the company money. He never did win the top prize of $25.

In addition to newsletters, there were yellowed newspaper clippings. Most of the time I could figure out why they had been saved, but not always. I put one aside for my brother. It was of a girl who lived down the road. 

Both of my brothers had been interested in her but it never went beyond simple friendship. The picture had been taken at a time when big hair was popular. I can’t imagine the clipping being of interest to anyone else.

The clouds finally decided to let the sun shine through and I ended my trip down memory lane. Now that  August is over, it is time to finish up all the summer projects and begin getting things ready for winter. I am exceedingly grateful that we don’t live in the path of the latest hurricane, or any other  major storm.

I am also grateful to whoever picked up that cactus that I set out by the telephone pole with a sign that said, “free” as it was no longer welcome inside my house. When I put it out there it reminded me of when Mom set most of her birds free.

She had raised birds off and on most of her life. We had parakeets when I was little. The last few years she had finches. 

One day she went to her doorway and set all but two or three of them free. We were shocked and surprised. After that, every time she saw a small bird she thought it was one of hers. On the other hand, when my brothers and I see small birds, we say, “Fly away! Be free!”

I’m not sure what the point of all this is, except that even sad memories contain humor. Or maybe the moral is that computer printouts will never take the place of yellowed newspaper clippings. If someone tells you to, “Fly away! Be Free!” I hope you have better luck than those birds did.