We had the viewing last night, and the funeral this morning. My friend Trav was already in Florida (thanks, man!), but his mom came by to both and was immensely sweet. They’re cool as hell. My knees were weak the whole time, but i got through it and held up much better than i thought i would. But it was horrible, to have to finalise it so.

This is what i wrote and read as an eulogy:

“Into every Life, a little rain must fall.” -Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

My grandmother saw a lot of rain, yet she was like sunshine to everyone whose life she touched, wherever she went. She was born into poverty in Montrose, Colorado, in 1917. She endured the Great Depression. Over the years she fought and prevailed over a number of illnesses, including multiple cancers. She even had the unenviable task of burying her beloved son Stephen. Yet I say that no one who ever met her went on to have a bad day afterward. Her charm and unique sense of humour lingered on long after she left the room; and I daresay that it will linger on long after today also. She was the light of many a life (including mine), and even in her passing, that light remains unsnuffed.

I inherited her love of music, and these past few days I have found some solace in my grief through at least a couple of songs. “What a Wonderful World” by Louis Armstrong, I think best summarizes her outlook on life, underlined with perseverance. She loved the world dearly and always sought to experience its many joys. She loved its inhabitants, and I think that she Understood that we are all just roommates on this Rock, hurtling through space as we struggle to define ourselves and our mission.

Another song that I have found comfort in is “It’s So Hard to Say Goodbye to Yesterday,” by Boyz II Men. One verse has become a mantra for me recently: “I’ll take with me the memories, to be my sunshine after the rain. It’s so hard to say goodbye to yesterday.” And there really are a lot of great memories that we can all take with us on our Journeys through this great, mad thing called Life. Many of them are punctuated by images of her, howling with great fits of laughter. She got a kick out of everything around her, despite the sorrows that sought in vain to overcome her.

I have always found saying goodbye to be a hard thing to do, but never more so than now, when I must say goodbye to my grandmother. Of all the places she loved to visit, I seem to remember her mentioning Hawaii an awful lot, maybe because she pronounced its name “Hawoy” and made it a sort of running joke. (She had a lot of running jokes!) I think that perhaps it is best to say goodbye in the native tongue of that island: “Aloha.”

Am really, really, really sad today.