One of those days

I don’t believe in bad days. Each moment should get to speak for itself without being drowned out by whatever else has happened in the same sunrise-sunset cycle. Resign myself to a bad day and next thing I know I’m writing off the week, the month, the season, the year, my earthly life.

But today too many painful things happened to too many people I love.

• The twins had their 3-year-old shots.
• Brielle crashed into a log in one of her first sledding runs, leaving her right eye swollen nearly shut.
• Rachelle spent the day in doctors’ offices—all morning with the punctured twins, all afternoon waiting to check out Brielle’s shiner at urgent care.
• Rachelle’s mom buried the man she called “Daddy,” while trying to be strong for the woman who called him “Honey.”

The day drew suffering like iron filings to a magnet.

• A mother who came here fleeing violence just watched two of her little boys come home from school beaten up in a single week, and she wanted me to give her advice on what to do now.
• A childhood friend lay a micron from death after 18 hours of surgery, 30 units of blood and 20 of plasma and platelets—this on the day her baby was delivered by emergency C-section.
• Heading up the snowy mountain, the highway patrol guided us around a tow truck winching a car gone over the edge, its driver’s fate uncertain but grim.

It was nearly 9 p.m. by the time our unfed stomachs rolled into Grandma’s driveway to pick up Ashlyn and Melía. The pure beauty of their beings had only begun to soak in to me when I plopped down onto a couch, Ashlyn on my lap, and banged my head harder than I can remember. It felt as if the kitchen countertop just above the sofa had reared back, gathered all the might of its granite inertia and swung into the top of my head with a satisfying crack.

Remember all that nice talk about “never a bad day,” letting each moment speak for itself? Presently every sad second of the day screamed in unison with the pain in my skull, and came out my mouth in a flood of wailing profanity, as I writhed on the carpet. It was as if the singing agony of the moment was so exquisite that it inspired all the other painful moments of the day to join in, like that old Coke commercial with the people holding candles. Except scarier.

Melía was silent. Ashlyn thought it was funny. Grandma felt horrible about having moved the couch. I was too tired and sick of the day to do anything but get up, embarrassed, deflated, surrounded by purlple-ish stars, and take the kids to the car.

Maybe I did write this one off as a bad day. But I’m holding out hope for tomorrow.

Of funerals and bedtime

Papa’s funeral was yesterday.

It has been tiring and beautiful. And in the process of saying good-bye, my kids and I have been teaching each other some new definitions. For example, I’m teaching them:

• Death: (n) sleep
• Casket: (n) bed

My favorites they have taught me are:

• Funeral: (n) party
• Tribute in song with pantomime by great-granddaughters to honor deceased: (n) dance contest

The girls had spent the long weekend “helping” Daddy put together a bulletin and slide show for their great grandfather, and were downright excited about “Papa’s party.” (We called it a “celebration” of Papa’s life—why not a party?) They bathed without complaint, put on their church clothes, descended the mountain crammed in the back of the Accord without even scratching each others’ eyes out. In fact, despite skipping a nap, they shared a Chicken McNuggets 10-pack among the three of them, Brielle in the middle handing out nuggets as each twin managed her own container of dip on either side. (Unheard of.)

The service was what it needed to be—a loving review of a life well lived. And the kids offered grace notes throughout it. Technical difficulties stopped the sound from playing during the slide show. This left us in a silence I can only call deathly, a silence from which Melía rescued us with her narration, audible throughout the room: “Dat is my Papa. Dat is my Nana. Dat is my MOMMY!” Ashlyn ran outside, broke a vase and reminded us how grateful we are for friends to scoop her up and prevent her from plowing straight into traffic. Tears and farewells and poetry and hymn and eulogy honored the 90-year-old patriarch in a dignified fashion. Rachelle managed to get through her song, Goodbye for Now, only choking up on the last two lines, which in its own way was as beautiful as the rest of her singing.

All this was preamble to what would easily have been Papa’s favorite part: the “dance contest,” featuring contestants Brielle, Melía and Ashlyn. Following their aunt’s lead, the girls did motions to You Raise Me Up. In their cherubim-white dresses, they carved laugh-wrinkle canals to drain our tears. Each child lost interest in the performance at various times during the song, pausing to check under fingernails, pick nose, eye loved ones or otherwise drift off to left field. Yet each refrain of “You raise me up…” brought them back, lifting hands from floor to sky, high as their tiny arms could reach.

Hours later, as the restaurant hosting the wake was rolling up the fire hoses used to clean up after our kids, I tucked the girls into bed. Melía, ever the night owl, brought up the song again. “We raise Papa up, Daddy.”

“Yes, Melía, Jesus will raise Papa up, sweetheart. You did such a good job helping people remember that today.”

“We raise Papa up, Daddy.”

“Melía, when Jesus raises Papa up, he will be so happy to see you. He will dance with you and play with you and run with you and tickle you.”

“Yeah! YEAH! Yay! YAY!” Melía was bouncing on the bed now, energized, as always, by her parents’ snowballing exhaustion.

“That’ll be fun, huh, Melía?”

“Yeah, dat will be fun. Dat will be FUN!”

“I hope Jesus does that soon, Melía. I can’t wait.”

“Yeah, I townt wait. I townt wait.”

“Night-night, Melia.”

“Night-night, Daddy.”

Night-night Papa. We can’t wait…