It’s been a rather stressful couple of weeks, but augmented by a family reunion.
On Monday, May
13th I found out that my Aunt Rose had died on Mother's Day. She is
the first of my Dad’s siblings to pass away since he died 22 years ago. She was
the middle sister of three. She was the first of his siblings to die in her
retirement years; age 71. It was a big shock to me. I totally wasn’t expecting
that, especially in this age of “70 is the new 60, or 55, or ‘insert age of
choice here’ “.
It did have a
bit of a silver lining however, at least for me. I got see all my cousins on my
Dad’s side again. Although it’s not like there’s any sort of barrier in place
preventing me from seeing them. There’s certainly no restraining order been
issued against me. I just tend to me kind of a loner; I’ve never been one to
just “drop by sometime”.
One event I was
extremely glad I attended recently is the 100th birthday of Oma
Bongartz (featured a few blogs ago). She is the maternal grandmother (Oma) of
two of my cousins on my Dad’s side. A large contingent of my Dad’s family was
there, including Aunt Rose. As per her usual custom she presented a packet of
photographs of her kids and grandkids for all to peruse. I can’t remember a
visit when she didn’t produce a packet of photos. It was kind of a trademark.
She must be one of a dwindling demographic that still gets the whole roll
developed. I don’t know for sure, but I would highly doubt that she followed
the digital revolution. Whereas I’m just as much about (learning) the art of creating
the perfect photo as I am about capturing the subject in the photo, she was all about using the camera merely as a device
to capture her family on film to share with others. It would be interesting to
know how many photo albums she created. I’ll ask one of my cousins one of these
days.
The
Celebration of Life service (after the formal funeral) was a wonderful tribute
to Aunt Rose. It began with two of her grandchildren (both in their early
twenties) reading a poem (written by her grand-daughter) tag-team style. Those
two are very close and it was easy to see how strong the bond was also between
them and their grandmother. Aunt Rose’s
middle daughter read a tribute. She did amazingly well considering the
challenging circumstances. I don’t know
if she realizes what an admirable display of public speaking that was.
My cousin Jeff
closed the verbal presentations with a humorous anecdote regarding “the line
lady”. Upon such an introduction there were a few furrowed brows. I certainly
didn’t know where he was going with that. Over the years he’d done a lot of
renovations on Aunt Rose’s house. She was all about jumping in and getting
her hands dirty. On one occasion Jeff was doing the cutting and Aunt Rose was
doing the measuring. She called out something like, “It’s 25 inches and 3
lines.” As it turns out, the “lines” were sixteenths of an inch. Apparently she
always said she couldn’t understand fractions, but I can just picture that
familiar gleam in her eye as she said it. It was just her way of teasing. My
Dad had that same look when he’d tease me as a kid.
The reminiscing
was later augmented by a slide show documenting her life and the people in it.
Everyone you’d expect to see was in it. It’s all about the relationships. She
indeed led a very enriched life.
Although I’m
still dealing with my own sense of guilt about not taking advantage of opportunities
to see her much over the last 20 years, at least I got to share in her warm
glow at Oma Bargartz’s birthday late last year as she shared the latest packet
of glossy snapshots of my cousins and their families. And I know she
appreciated hearing me tell her of the fond memories I had as us kids would run
around the house playing Kick the Can during family get-togethers. And to top
it off, as we came in for a snack, there would be the familiar sight of the big
freezer in the foyer topped by a half dozen or so cakes! Baking was also one of her
passions.
Although it may sound corny to say, knowing the kind of no-nonsense person she was, I think she'd be happy to know that it wasn't all sadness at the service. In my opinion, people don't strive to cause pain in others, even at their own passing. The fact that this event brought many of us together again would make Aunt Rose happy. I can feel her smiling as I'm typing.
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| At Oma Bongartz's recent birthday; Aunt Rose (right) with Aunt Erica. |
