The Joy of Funerals, page 15
I take another deep, cleansing breath, slip on my glasses, open the door, and proceed out of the diner like a normal person.
The weather is outstanding, warm and beautiful. Clear. I’m sure Edna is thankful for this. I’m sure everyone attending Archie’s funeral will comment on what a gorgeous day it is.
People are predictable. In the winter, they stand in a huddled mass of tears, matted down in thick wool coats, scarves wrapped tightly around necks, hands in leather gloves. In the summer, the warm air rings of sorrow and mourners sigh in sadness as cotton jackets and black dresses blow in the breeze. To me it doesn’t matter what season a funeral takes place; I enjoy them just the same.
I stride into the chapel and attempt to hide my pride. While searching for Edna Siden, Archie’s wife, I nod and exchange sympathetic looks with others. I stick my hand into my pocket and finger the obit from the paper, hoping the words will magically transfer into my subconscious. I feel the coarse paper, think about the heavy black ink rubbing off onto my skin, as if the dead’s souls are rubbing on to me. This one reads: Archie Siden, 82, beloved husband of Edna, father to Jack, and brother to Eli, passed away on Thursday due to complications from a heart attack. Archie was a handbag manufacturer and the first to design the Audrey Bag. It looked like a small, round hatbox turned sideways. Audrey Hepburn donned it in the movie Breakfast at Tiffany’s.
I take a quick scan, survey the mahogany-colored room, make some mental notes—emergency exit, bathroom, coat rack—before seeing if anyone looks familiar. Though the chapel is crowded, I’m able to pick Edna out instantly. Grief is inked onto her face like a large red birthmark. A temporary tattoo of sadness for the permanently widowed.
Edna is a small, plump, gentle-looking woman who appears to be in her seventies. Several people are at her side. They have formed a protective ring around her, ready to catch her should she fall over, should her body finally register the shock.
I approach slowly, making my way through her line of bodyguards.
“Hello, I’m Zoe.”
Her face is still. Frozen.
“You don’t know me, but I worked with your husband years ago,” I tell her. “In fact, Archie gave me my first job.” My palms are still wet from racing, and I wipe them on my skirt before reaching for her gloved hand to hold in mine. She looks into my eyes and her tears start. “He was a very kind man. Always ready to listen, always had a smile on his face.”
She tightens her grip, half smiles, thinking about what I’ve just said. I can tell she’s recalling a past memory, flipping through a catalogue of moments when Archie was especially sweet. She gives me a firm, quick squeeze as someone takes her arm, ushering her along. The rabbi opens the doors to the chapel and we all file in.
I sit in the back pew with strangers.
A lonely, eerie silence envelops us as the smell of wood and other people’s perfume mix together. I let the organ music drift through me as I stare at the mourners, captivated by their closeness, by the bond they all possess. I watch as they enter and take a seat in the chapel: husbands and wives who sit close together, hands gripping hands, one the supporter, one the consoled; gay men who clasp each other, hands around backs of heads, and tight hugs; small children who long to run up to the casket and are restrained by their parents. But mostly, I’m envious of sisters who sit so close together that they look as if they are trying to become one body, a mush of memories and history congealed like a thin strand of popcorn hung purposely on a Christmas tree.
In order to fight the nervousness, I count heads. Other times, I’ll play a mental game: number of women versus men; people wearing black versus other colors. Sometimes, I’ll think I see someone I know, or someone who recognizes me. A pounding begins in my chest as I hold my breath. A buzzing fills my head as everyone becomes a blur, a slurry mass of familiar faces and features. I feel my body shut down, organ by organ, and wait in utter silence.
Sitting in the back is sometimes alienating, but when it’s full like it is today, it’s often the best place. Apologetic latecomers slide in, guilt-ridden, hoping to go unnoticed, whispering to me, asking if they’ve missed anything. Or they sometimes feel inclined to share the reason why they’re late. Traffic was awful, the wife will say. Or, We sat on the FDR for an hour. I fill them in quietly, explaining who has spoken, what they’ve missed, talking about the deceased as if he were part of my own family. Only after I’ve introduced myself and connected with them on some significant level can I rest and breathe a sigh of relief. I have been defined. I have proven I belong. I have earned a right to stay.
Archie’s brother, Eli, is first to speak. He clears his throat and grips the edges of the wooden podium. He talks of a big brother who protected him from school bullies, who took him in during the Great Depression, gave him a job at the factory, and eventually made him a partner when the market crashed and brokers were out of work. He speaks of a supportive, smart, family man. Someone I’d have liked to know.
As he continues his eulogy, the audience forms a chorus of sniffles and sighs. The nodding of heads, the holding of hands, and the drying of tears all happen at once. I want to reach for someone, but I’m alone.
Later, Edna introduces me to others as one of Archie’s favorite employees from the old days. She beams like a proud parent as her lady friends ooh and ahh, telling me how nice it was for me to pay my respects, how happy it would have made Archie to know he was so well remembered.
“You never forget a man who does so much good,” I say.
They nod, eyes glassy.
For the most part, I stay silent. I listen to others who tell stories and share rare glimpses of the recently deceased. I eavesdrop, collecting pieces of random information, all of which I will use to compose my own story, braiding it together into a tapestry of fabricated memories.
Something is to be said for the relative who can embellish on a tale or two about someone when they were six or seven, or call them by an old nickname they have outgrown, or embarrass them with information privy only to an insider. There’s a level of understanding and forgiveness that can’t be recreated with anyone else. They are bookmarks in each other’s pasts as they reminisce about the only thing they have in common. Conversations pick up exactly where they left off years ago. And as they share stories, something magical and intense happens. A small puzzle piece slips quietly into a fading picture. Slips quietly into me.
Before people leave for the cemetery, Edna goes out of her way to find me and asks if I have her address. She and Archie’s family will be sitting shiva. Do I want to stop by?
‘’I’d love to come, but I’ve got to visit my father at the nursing home,” I tell her.
She smiles. “Such a dear,” she adds, putting her hand on my cheek. It rests there for a moment, soft and warm. Then she leans forward and kisses my forehead ever so gently. For an instant, I’m five years old, standing on a stool with my name on it, leaning over a porcelain sink, looking into the mirror in my grandmother’s bathroom. I smell Edna’s rosy perfume as it merges with the scent of Ivory soap, which my grandmother used. Her hands, smooth as silk, would lather up my dirty face, rinse it clean, and pat it dry. Afterward, she’d lean in and kiss me right above the bridge of my nose. My grandmother’s lips were tender and warm, like Edna’s gloved hand. Then she would press her cheek to mine.
For a moment, I can’t catch my breath. I just want to stand here for the rest of my life with Edna Rosen’s hand on my face. Unexpected tears well up in my eyes. I do my best to blink them away. Real tears are not usually allowed during these processions. They are reserved for the quiet darkness of my apartment.
Edna removes a handkerchief from her pocket. Red petals line the corners; patches of lipstick are smattered in the middle. From my angle, it looks like a small abstract painting. She dabs her eyes. “Oh, sweetheart, don’t cry. He would be so happy you were here.”
All I can do is nod.
I return to the office. My absence has clearly not been missed. I highly doubt my father’s firm would collapse if there weren’t enough pencils, Post-its, or coffee. Technically, my job is shopping for office supplies. Thank God I went to college and got that degree in fine arts.
As a child, I loved coming here. Found it thrilling to watch my father scurry around, make important phone calls, and hold meetings with his colleagues in the room that held all the big, daunting books. Now I work here. It’s a pity job. Everyone knows it.
I enter the bathroom and find Lilly, one of my co-workers, already doing a makeup check. Her blush, eye shadow, and powder are sprawled on the marble slab. I reach for her blush brush and sweep it across my face. I don’t need to ask if I can use it. Here in the bathroom, everything is community property.
She’s mid-sentence as the chimes from St. Patrick’s Cathedral interrupt our space, filling the air with gongs and bells. I watch her expression change to delight as she proceeds to do her best Shannon imitation. She gets very solemn, puffs out her cheeks, puts a hand in the air, and in a low, singsongy voice, says, “People.” Then a little louder, “People. Can I please ask you all to settle down? I would like to have a moment of silence.”
We both laugh at this and for a minute, I am a bad girl. The cool, rebellious member of my family. Lilly knows it’s safe in here with me, mimicking our co-worker, because I’m her ticket to freedom. Her “Get Out of Jail” card.
It’s hard to fire the boss’s daughter. Harder, still, to make friends. People are nice to you because they have to be. Conversations stop when you walk by. Lunch offers are few and after work drink invites nonexistent. I don’t keep in touch with many people from college and hardly anyone from high school. The friends I made as a child have moved away, relocated to warm states like California, Florida, and Texas. Others have married and now have families of their own. The office is all I have.
I smile and clap. “Well done.” This is how people bond at my father’s firm, sharing makeup and poking fun at others. But in the back of my mind, I’m wondering who else has died, what the body looked like, and if I can pull a double.
I glance at my watch.
“Nina, can you get your father to order new chairs? The ones we have now hurt my ass.” She looks from her reflection to mine, her face in mid-freeze, the bright red lipliner an inch away from her lips. “You must have some pull or something. Right?” Even though Lilly is Asian, she has no accent and is more American than I.
My foot does a little tap on the bathroom tile. I need to get back to my desk. I’m sure I’ve carelessly left the Times open and circled the obit announcement in red, as if I were looking for a job.
Lilly’s mouth is still moving. She’s saying something about a party she went to, then talks about a new Hermès bag she’s bought and finally comes full circle, focusing on the office chairs.
I wish she’d shut up. My head is going to explode if she doesn’t.
Officemates say a restrained hello, or they smile as I pass them enroute to my father’s office. I stand in his door frame and wait to be noticed. His glasses are perched on his nose, blue contract pages are in one hand, manila folder with pink and white papers are in the other.
I take stock of his belongings. Coffee mug, bottle of water, ink blotter, leather couch, the crisp shirt that hangs on the hook, and though I can’t see it from my angle, I know a clean, fresh “courtroom” suit is in the closet. A black, lacquer-like basket on the floor holds magazines and newspapers: The Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, and The Law Review are his afternoon readings.
“Nina,” he says, surprised, as if I’ve just dropped by the office unexpectedly, as if he hasn’t seen me here every day, or even two hours ago.
It’s still sunny when I leave. Labor Day comes late this year and Manhattanites are taking advantage of the last long weekend. Lexington Avenue is littered with people waiting for the jitney bus to take them out to the Hamptons. The young ones sit on their weekend bags, talking on their cells, reading paperback books. The older ones lean against the buildings for support, their dogs in Louis Vuitton carrying cases.
I think about Edna as I unlock my door, as I hang up my clothes, as I open the plastic bag that still houses my damp shirt and release it into the laundry hamper.
I linger in the closet, looking at all the bags. Each outfit is sealed in plastic to save the smells. Like flashes from firecrackers, the scents ignite my memory as they come flooding back. I unzip the bag that holds my navy suit. It smells like bagels and lox. Instantly, I recall the Saperstein funeral. The prairie skirt with Indian motif smells of ham and beer, the O’Mara wake. That time, they let me help in the kitchen, and I got to dance in the dining room. One of the cousins held me close and told me I was pretty. That he wanted to kiss me but his brother was watching us, and it would have been inappropriate. My gray slacks and matching wool sweater reek of cigar smoke. I remember sitting in someone’s library with several men and laughing at one of the stories a friend was telling about the deceased. I take a deep whiff of the flannel pants, feel slightly satisfied, and zip the bag closed.
When I can’t sleep, I read through the scrapbook of funerals I’ve attended. A hundred and three, to date. All entries get the obit, plus a description of the event, the people I’ve met, and the soundings. Sometimes I lift a napkin or a matchbook. Other times, I’ll snap a few pictures in or outside the chapel the next day. Click—I’ve immortalized them. Like the people I visit, I can never forget. My favorites are the letters of thanks I’ve received from devoted wives, lonely husbands, orphaned children, and friends of the deceased—souvenirs of the lives I’ve touched and the lives gone.
This is why I go to funerals.
Today the Times reports on a man who was killed in a terrible car accident. He was thirty-eight. Young. Only four years older than I. His wife, Leslie, is an advertising executive. Her husband, Dr. Larry Shappell, was Chief of Staff at Mount Sinai Hospital. He was the youngest person ever to hold that title. The picture of him in the paper, a black-and-white photo taken in his office, shows him shaking hands with the president of the hospital. You can see his plaques on the wall, his organized desk, and a frame with a photo of his wife. He and his wife have a home in White Plains. They have no children.
I fantasize that he’s my husband. Visualize him coming home from a double shift at the hospital having operated on a young girl or a sick teenager with congenital heart failure. His hands would be red and raw from scrubbing all day, his eyes tired and heavy. I stare at the second picture of Larry in a turtleneck and slacks, standing next to his wife, who’s dressed in a classy black suit, sweater thrown purposely over her shoulders. A silver pendant hangs around her neck. They look as though they’re posing for a Banana Republic catalogue. These are people I should be friends with. People my mother would be happy to see me shuttling off to visit in the Hamptons or spending long weekends with on the Cape.
My choices for funeraling are very systematic.
First, I race through the pages looking for familiar names—friends of my parents, old classmates, mothers and fathers who let me stay in their swanky apartments on Fifth and Park Avenues, fed me homecooked meals, incorporating each food group element, let me call them by their first names, included me in games of Monopoly, Sorry, and Clue, talked to me, made me feel wanted, and let me be part of their surroundings. I check for business associates from the jobs I’ve held or haven’t been able to keep, for friends of my grandparents, and friends of friends; these are all level one, firsthand connections.
If I don’t find anyone whose name rings a bell, I move to level two, personal association. Like betting on a horse, I choose a name I like, one that reminds me of a fond memory. Thelma, the name of my third-grade teacher, or Steven, the first boy I kissed.
Next is level three, movie and musical references. Last week I went to Rupert Pinner’s wake because it reminded me of Robert De Niro’s character, Rupert Pumpkin, from Martin Scorsese’s King of Comedy.
And finally, four, the riskiest of the bunch—eeny, meeny, miny, moe. I rarely get to four and have only attended two funerals from that category: Shechal’s, a taxi driver who was shot in the head by a fare, and Svetlana’s, a Russian immigrant who died of streptococcus.
I’ve gotten lucky with Larry. He’s perfect.
I rifle though my crammed kitchen drawer for scissors and carefully cut out his photo. I reach for the glue stick and come across old prescription slips I haven’t filled. I fan them out, think about collecting enough to wallpaper my bathroom but stuff them back into their place. I stick Larry’s photo into my scrapbook along with the obit.
These drawers are normally clean and organized, my house spotless. You never know when a visitor will pop by or when you’ll meet a neighbor in the hallway while throwing out the trash or riding down in the elevator to get the mail or to see if you have a package. Sometimes I hang out in the lobby, talking with my doormen, telling them I have a leaky pipe or that the intercom isn’t working or I’ve made too much pasta for dinner, would they like some? We chitchat as I eye the door, hoping one of the tenants I know will walk in, cheeks rosy from the cold, too many packages in their arms. Or they’ll be walking their dogs, the kind that jump on you and give licks to anyone who will pet them. A therapist I saw for a few weeks in college told me I reminded him of a cocker spaniel, always looking for someone to play with. At our last session, I barked on my way out.
The Shappell funeral is Friday at the White Plains Memorial Chapel. I usually attend those within the five boroughs of Manhattan, though I make exceptions for special ones like Larry’s. I like the train ride. Like the feeling of having somewhere to go. People are extra-friendly. You can strike up a conversation with the person seated across from you or ask for directions.
The night before, I surf the internet to learn about heart problems. Perhaps I can have a murmur or a nasty case of asthma that’s left me with a weak heart. The good thing about murmurs is you can look fine and still have one since they’re hard to detect. Some don’t require surgery and can be treated with medication. I find the perfect disease, marsocoma, the slight breakdown of the vascular organ. A drug called Trilladon strengthens the valves and blood flow along with the tissues. I practice saying my disease and print out the information from The Heart Association’s home site.
