When I was planning Mr. Virgo’s funeral, I was dismayed at the priest’s lack of cooperation in the details. I had several songs I wanted shared and speakers we loved to say a few words. He said those things did not belong in a traditional Catholic funeral and having never been to one, I knew no different. I didn’t have it in me to fight anyway. It was a nice service…but I felt it could have been so much more if there were tributes and music. So, yesterday I went to the cemetery armed with my iPad and played all of Mr. Virgo’s favorite songs, including those I had chosen for his funeral. Nessun Dorma, Ave Maria, To Where You Are, Go Rest High on That Mountain…among others. There were abundant bluebirds and butterflies. I brought a couple of rocks from WV to place on his grave. And I found this…a pack of Pall Malls, his brand since he started smoking them in Vietnam. Even though these are what killed him, I was touched to see someone had been thinking of him and came to visit leaving the familiar green box behind. There are little stones and a penny placed carefully on the rocks surrounding him…all mementoes left to let me know someone was there. As long as we keep our loved ones in our hearts and their names on our lips, they are never completely gone.
Yesterday’s was a different kind of goodbye for me. It felt like a completion of sorts…like I finally got to have that funeral the way I wanted it. And it was symbolic in other ways. I’m moving on with my life now. I’m pursuing other interests. I want love in my life again. I want companionship. It felt so healthy to let go of another basketful of grief and raise my shoulders a little higher. I felt more free when I left the cemetery. I will never forget him. He will be my forever love and will remain a part of me. But there’s room in my heart now for another. And for that I am most grateful.
Goodbye, my love. And thank you for everything you have given me…including the courage to go on without you.
❤
“I thank God, whom I serve, as my ancestors did, with a clear conscience, as night and day I constantly remember you in my prayers.”
2 Timothy 1:3