Goodbye, Daddy

Sunday June 26, 2011                                               Day 361

It was a little after midnight and I had just closed my computer to begin my nightly ablutions when Roger, who had gone to bed earlier, came in to hug me and hold me and tell me that Shelli had called with the news that Daddy had died. We talked for a while, and I returned to the computer to send a couple of messages. In the meantime Shelli called again and we talked a bit. I finished getting ready for bed but had trouble drifting off – my mind was racing in a thousand different directions. Wanda sent an email telling me that if I didn’t come home for the funeral, she thought everyone would understand. But it was when I read her words that I knew I couldn’t miss my father’s funeral. So we began making plans. I called Jimmy to tell him I would be coming home, and would let him know when we finalized our plans. He told me that Jane was already in transit to Muleshoe. I put in calls to Alicia, Eric, Mary Ellen, Wanda (Skype) and Charlotte. I needed to hear everyone’s voices and talk with them a bit. I did not get to speak to Eric or to Charlotte, but I rectified that later.

This afternoon we rented bicycles and rode out to a wildlife refuge along the Lez near where we used to walk with Peggy and Egan. There were problems with my bicycle—the front fender was rubbing against the tire and making it very hard to ride. Roger managed to bend the fender out of the way, and we swapped bikes. There were lots of hills to traverse, and we are out of shape. When we got to the wildlife refuge, we walked into it about 20 minutes, then turned around and walked back out, as it is a narrow linear park along the river, with only one entrance and one exit. We were utterly exhausted when we got back.

We rested a bit and I called Jimmy again to discuss timing with him, suggesting that he schedule the funeral for Saturday, fully a week after Daddy’s death. This is a long delay for a Protestant funeral in West Texas, where they usually bury their dead within two to three days of death, but I felt like it would also be easier on the younger generation, many of whom have work considerations and find it easier to take off on a weekend, and we had not yet finalized our plans. There was the complication that Saturday commences the Independence Day weekend, but we finally settled on Saturday, with Jimmy admonishing me that they would hold the funeral that day whether I was there or not. Jane was there with him, We did a speakerphone call with Jimmy, Susan and Jane on the other end; as a result, I did not get to speak to Jane separately.

Roger spent a good deal of time on the internet looking at possibilities for flights – out of Dublin, Paris, Barcelona, and elsewhere. We did not make a reservation yet, as we struggled with what to do with our existing tickets for flight out of Dublin on July 20, and also our non-refundable train tickets to Paris and on to London on Thursday.