And the Funeral...

Grief is a tricky bastard.

I just thought you should know, in case you weren't acquainted.

I was surprised by it, you see.

My Uncle died. I wouldn't say that we were close like peas and carrots. But he was a sweet, soft-spoken man who was always there when anyone needed him. He and his wife helped me out quite a lot when I was at University in Utah. *Not the University of Utah.* *The other one.* (If you're Mormon and/or familiar with Utah, you know that making that distinction is a very large, very big darned deal.)

I debated going to his funeral for a couple of days. And then, when Friday morning came around, and I found myself, once again on the bawling out my guts while sitting at my desk at work (whereas only moments before I'd been perfectly stable, working away...), I knew I had to go.

So I called up my amazing little sister, who not only offered to swap cars with me,
(My car: awesome Jeep Wrangler. Gas Mileage: CRIMINAL. Her car: Comfy Toyota Camry. Gas Mileage: Much better.) but she took her car in to get an oil change and ended up putting new tires on it.

I ran home, packed, swapped out my jeep and was on the road by 3:30, heading North, toward Salt Lake. If you know the Bay Area, you know that heading North on 80 at 3:30 on a friday is the stupidest Faux Pas you can make in all of Bay Area traffic Faux Pas. 

Instead of the open road, Gridlock, and two extra hours of driving. Blech.

775 miles, one one-hour nap and two tanks of gas later (Starting price in California: $4.09/gal. price in Winnemucca, NV: $3.69. Something terribly wrong with that picture? I think so.) I rolled into my destination at 5:30 AM, showered and settled into a comfy bed at a friend's house for 4 hours of sleep before getting up and going to the Funeral.

So far as funerals go, this one was, well, a funeral. It was simple and sweet. But it was full of familiar faces that reminded me of childhood times spent in the company of Uncle Ray.

Boating on the great Salt Lake. Swimming in the pool in his back yard. A BBQ and Aunt Eudonne's famous baked beans. Learning that real cakes don't come from boxed mixes and that Blue slurpees are just about the best thing ever on a hot, Utah summer day. A red minivan. Rhubarb pie. Liberty Park.

I'd heard before that attending the funeral of a loved one gives you the closure needed to move on. It's a symbolic thing. It's a visual, visceral thing that gives us a marker to remember and associate with that loved one. It makes it okay. It doesn't fill the gap, but it makes it okay. And it puts that tricky bastard, Grief, back into the dark void it came from in the first place.

1660 miles.
Five tanks of gas.
24 hours driving.
One life well-lived, remembered.