Sunday Update

It's been rather the eventful week. First of all, my grandmother shuffled off this mortal coil on Tuesday, which set off the requisite chain of events that culminated with visitation on Friday and funeral yesterday. Her death was expected, as she had been in declining health for quite some time. When I last saw her Tuesday a week ago she was incredibly tired and ready to go. She was at peace with the course of nature, which, in turn, served as a balm of sorts for the family.

Meeting with the extended family and old friends over the last few days was a bit of an adventure in its own way. Most of these people I had not seen for probably 15 to 20 years, so polite conversation (those generic things one talks about with total strangers) was amiable, but admittedly awkward given the fact that I knew these people at one time, but now...well, not so much. Most of my cousins are married now with children of their own, but their collective world view was of the small town sort that for the most part doesn't extend beyond the boundaries of their hometown, immediate family, and church, safe from the "other," the unknown that occurs beyond, which, once encountered and understood, necessitates the casting off of old ways and the adoption of a more liberating world view.

The funeral yesterday was well done save for the memorial service, which started out as one (a memorial service), but somehow ended up as this obnoxious fire and brimstone sermon, an inappropriate attempt by the pastor to win souls by going after sorrowful hearts. The tone of the sermon earned rounds of "amens" from those inclined towards such nonsense, and rather the amount of indignant eye rolling from the few (myself and my sister included) whose broader view of life allows them to see such nonsense for what it really is.

So in some ways, the events of the last few days amounted to what could correctly be considered culture shock. To return home and discover strangers in the place of long-lost relatives and old acquaintences was something for which I had not sufficiently prepared myself. Certainly it was I who had changed, and not them. At times I felt more out of place there than when I was in Bangkok a number of years ago, where I spoke not the language and the culture was prevailingly alien to me.

But there's an interesting observation in all of this. My grandmother was largely responsible for who I was to become and am today. Some of my earliest and fondest memories of her are from my single digit years, those biweekly summer excursions to the library in her ancient green Dodge Dart where she, my sister, and I would comb the shelves for interesting books to eagerly devour over the coming weeks. She instilled in us at an early age her passion for reading, thirst for knowledge and, by extenstion, the inevitable consequence of questioning things, of seeking out a world larger than the one into which we were born. Whether or not this consequence was intended...well, that's difficult to say with any degree of certainty. She was born in 1920 and was certainly a product of her era. Yet with her love of reading, I cannot help but to think that perhaps there was a certain twinkle in her eye as we puttered home from the library so long ago, with my sister and I prioritizing our respective stacks of books or already quietly at work on them as broad fields of corn or peanuts passed slowly by.