THE FUNERAL PLANNER

Chapter 10 Part 1: Organizational Strategy - The Resurrection of Lights Out

Chapter 10 Part 1

Richard and I work the bar serving drinks and chitchat­ting. Close to the register sits a pad of yellow legal paper with notes scribbled all over it under the heading of Table of Contents. I’ve got a red pen stuck behind one ear and a yellow Magic Marker behind the other ear as I pour Wally his usual. Richard’s at the other end of the bar lis­tening to Rocky.

“Did I ever tell you about the time I had to clean out my brother’s closet?” asks Rocky. “Picnic it was not. My mom couldn’t handle it. Just seeing his old baseball mitt tore her apart. He was the all-star pitcher, ya know, all through college. Did I tell you that? He had such a bright future. My father made sure he had to be out of town when we opened up the closet. He couldn’t even come within ten feet of Glenn’s bed­room without losing it. It was...an emotional mess.”

I pull my pen from behind my ear and thoughtfully jot some notes on the pad.

“Did your parents ever recover?” asks Richard.

“Yeah,” says Rocky, then he finishes the last of his beer. “A few years later, they rented out his room to a college kid and they became this sort of minifamily. They all kind of saved each other. Hey, thanks for listening, man. I gotta run.” Rocky winks at Richard and starts to head out the door.

I lift a finger toward Rocky. “Um, Rocky, I didn’t get any...”

Rocky shakes his head. “Sorry, Maddy. No mail today.”

“Okay, thanks. I was just wondering...because sometimes you forget to put the mail in the mailbox and then some­times you forget to bring it to the bar. But that’s cool. It’s not like I don’t have enough to read here between books on death and blogs on funerals, ya know.”

Rocky offers a perfunctory nod. “Right,” he says, and leaves.

“You know,” says Richard. “Sometimes loss is not about the dead. A lot of times it’s about the living.”

I stare at him. “Do you see that sign?” I point to a hand­written note on the cash register: “No Conundrums Allowed.”

Richard grins. “I forgot. Look, sometimes you have to con­front your pain by faking the death of someone who’s hurt you in order to move on.”

I quickly change the subject because, well, it’s too frig-gin’ painful. “Hmm. Thanks. But you know what, Rich­ard? I think we should have a section on how to Confront the Closet. You know, how do you deal with grief when you have to face the articles that represented the very life of the deceased? It was hard enough with Uncle Sam. I can’t imagine how it must be for a parent who loses a child or for a couple who loses a spouse, even if it’s a couple that only just started to have a life together after bonding over athletic activities like bowling and Eskimo rolls and...other stuff...but then it ended for some unknown reason...”

“Impossible,” pipes in Wally. “Grief is a can of worms. And if you can hand me a road map on that one, by golly, bring it on. Could have saved me years. Instead—I let the moths destroy everything in the closet. And now I’m helping Sally through it.”

“How are you helping her?” asks Richard.

“I let her talk about every single memory that comes up from every single piece of clothing. Takes a long time. We’re just getting through his socks right now.” Wally sips his drink. “Joe had a lot of socks...and every one of them tells a story.”

I frown, wondering what kind of stories all those socks could tell.

Richard cocks his head toward me. “What are the chap­ter headings so far?”