Looking Back

 This morning started a bit differently. We had a funeral to go to. Tim knew him as a teenager. I knew him from working with him. He was such a funny guy. Always good humored. Quick to shake off any irritation. I always admire people like that. I used to eat lunch with him and his girlfriend when I worked nights.

His girlfriend was one of those rough people who seemed to have spent her whole life doing battle with some damn body. She was quick to take offense, and to be honest, she said things that I didn't understand at all. Her son had moved away to take a job. There's something I could relate to, having a son on the other side of the state. A daughter in Afghanistan. But what I couldn't relate to was when she said, "Well, I hope he fails. I hope he falls flat on his face and gets his ass back here where he belongs."  That shocked me, that any mother would say such a thing. I mean, I missed my kids terribly, but I raised them to be independent, and I expected that they would make their own lives and do their own thing. I wished them well, and they have done well, which makes me feel as if I wasn't a total failure as a mother. 

But I digress.

There were other things too, and it quickly became obvious that we would never be good friends. By the end of it, I found her pretty selfish. She could also be pretty mean. I wound up working a different shift and that brought that acquaintance to a quiet close. 

Today, at the funeral home, I noticed something. She sat by herself. Only one of her sons attended, and while he sat next to her, he did not touch her. He did not look at her. The dearly departed's first wife and his kids and grands and brothers and nephews and I don't know who all sat all together. 

But the girlfriend sat alone. Her son next to her but not with her, if you can understand what I mean.

Tim and I sat in the back, and just before the service began, her face just crumpled, and she cried quietly. Alone. 

And it was the alone that got me. 

I am not everyone's cup of tea. Sometimes it seems as if I might not be anyone's cup of tea. I just seem to operate differently than most people in this world, and I don't know what it is exactly that makes me so different or why I am what I am.  Last year was kind of scary with Tim's issues and suddenly, I got this feeling that it could just as easily have been me sitting up there all by myself. 

I watched her crying and I couldn't not do it. I went up and sat next to her and held her hand. She cried even harder and said, "Thank you." I whispered back, "I just couldn't stand to see you alone." She said, "This is awful." 

That was it really. 

The family spoke during his eulogy. Told funny stories about him. When someone said something about his favorite food, the reply came back in unison: 'Fried bologna sandwiches'. And his girlfriend wept and whispered, "I've still got his bologna in the refrigerator." 

She did not fit in, either, and that was plain to see, and it appeared that there were some pretty hard feelings about something. I have no idea what, and I didn't much care. That's somebody else's drama. I know the girlfriend is a hard person. 

After the service, I walked back to Tim. He was visiting with some people. We walked out of the funeral home, and surprisingly, Tim did not want to rush back down to go to work. He wanted to go to a restaurant a couple blocks away for lunch, and so we did, and when we finished, Tim said, "I want to take a drive down to Sheffield" and so we did. He drove along saying, "We lived here (pointing) and we walked to school every morning." It was quite a distance and kids these days would be bused. He drove up to where his old high school had been. He was the last class to graduate from the old school. He told me what that old building was like. He drove past his old friends' houses, and reminisced. 

We came home then, and changed into work clothes and we got in the car and headed for the new build. We stopped in at that tent sale where we got the ceramic tile for the bathroom yesterday. They had some small windows that Tim was interested in to put in at each end of the attic for ventilation. No one knew the pricing when we stopped in on Sunday. Tim stopped in today, the guy came out, took a look, and said, "$25 each." We bought all four, and put them in the car. 

I got the insulation done. I cut the 2 x 10s into 36 inch lengths for the 12 stair treads and he got those blasted stairs built. We worked quietly together, each thinking our own thoughts. 

And that was today. 

And then we came home. 

Late Edit: Tim is watching some movie called Keoma that has the most godawful soundtrack I've ever heard in my life. I am not a trained musician, but holy cow, this is BAAAAAADDD. My ears are bleeding. I advise you all to find it and come back here right away to agree with me.