tommy

My father’s funeral was a somber affair. Gray, winter day in Cleveland, Ohio, the nation’s capital of gray, winter days. My dad passed only five months after my mother. She died of Alheimer’s. He was a cancer victim. Prostate. It lit up his body a month after mom went. My sisters ran the funeral service. It was a bit overdone, but they both gravitated to the dramatic. My dad was a good man. Simple. A bit confused. Not very insightful. But he loved unconditionally. That was his gift -- and his gift to us.
Tommy was at the funeral. He was one of the six pallbearers. He accompanied us to the Glen Mar Country Club for the reception. He wore an ill-fitting blue-pinstriped suit with a yellow and black Hawaiian shirt. Ponytail. Galoshes. Sunglasses. He ate alone. I ate with my nephews, then joined his table.
“Nice service,” he said. His sunglasses were pushed atop his head. The beard below his mouth was dotted with bread crumbs.
“Let’s have lunch, tomorrow,” I said.
“Sure. Why?”
“I don’t know, exactly,” I said.
“I can understand that,” he said.
“Noon?”
“Eleven-thirty,” he said.
“OK.”
“Ellen’s bossy as ever,” he said.
“I know,” I said.
His mouth was full, but that didn’t stop him. “Good grits, eh?”
I nodded. He smiled.
Outside, it had begun to snow.