It's 2:00. There's an hour to go. But I'm not being a drama queen or anything.
This morning, we offered breakfast to the staff (coffee, bagels), along with donuts and cookies, which the kids were welcome to as well. People have indeed been dropping by or emailing to tell us how much the library has meant to them and that they are sad to see it go. It went just as I had hoped.
The SCM and the Colleague and I will be back in here Monday and Tuesday, but only to move out. The library will be closed to the public while we move our boxes and computers and files and things to the places we are going. We'll be dismantling the library computers. We can't have kids in here because we'll be coming and going, so we can't provide supervision.
So, the rest of my trip.
Wednesday morning we rendezvoused at my cousin's house and hugged and held each other for a while. Then we went in two cars over to his mother's apartment, where, to my surprise, she recognized the Sibs and me right away. I had thought she might not, because her memory is just awful. But she did. She started talking about a pain she's been having (it's nothing) and other things, and how she was feeling good that day and decided she would learn to like where she's living and get along with people and it would be okay. Oy. She asked her son if he knew why she hadn't been able to get his brother on the phone for a few days. He told her in as gentle a way as someone possibly could that Peter had died.
She was surprised, she didn't get it, she did get it; she cried but did not become hysterical or, as we feared, have a stroke. She knew that he was ill, but had no idea he had gotten as bad as he was. We were there awhile and then we all left, including my aunt, and went to my cousin's house.
We were there all day, being with family, including his four children, whom I totally adore. My aunt repeated herself eight billion times, and insisted that it was her right to determine Pete's burial details. (It is not, of course.) So we dealt with that all day. Near 6:00, we went over to their local synagogue for a memorial service, which pretty much everyone found a little strange. Pete's brother didn't want a rabbi who never knew him to give the eulogy, so I spoke for a few minutes, along with a cousin from the other side of their family. How did I feel about doing that? Frankly, I felt priveleged, if that makes any sense. Afterwards, we went back to their house, along with 30 or so people, and ate, which I think is the universal post-funeral activity, regardless of religion or ethnicity.
The Sibs and her husband and I made it back to our hotel by 9:00, so I saw Lost and read diaries, but didn't post. We were back with the family Thursday until we left for the airport around 2:30.
I would like never ever ever ever again to travel with my sister and her husband. I'm just going on record here. Which is too bad for me, because my cousin's eldest is being Bar Mitzvahed in September, and the three of us will be going back for that.
Now that I'm home, I have a chore to perform, which is that I need to make up a short explanation of who everyone in the family is, with pictures, and mail it to my aunt so I can start calling her again and she'll know who I am and who I'm talking about. Kind of like the family picture book I made for R when she was one, a kind of cheat sheet. Talk about your full circles.
