ashes

Dad’s ashes, such as they are, now reside on my kitchen counter (mostly), except the bit that escaped the box and I shook under the maple tree muttering “ashes to ashes” while the neighbor ran the hedge trimmer next door. I have an additional quarter cup that I gathered from the folds of the ripped bag he was otherwise contained inside, siphoned into a manila envelope. And the rest are still in the torn bag, now duct taped together, itself enfolded in a new bag, and stuffed in the Amazon box that previously held a shipment of 6-foot co-ax cables. I put a beer and a piece of chocolate cake for him next to the ash box – disturbingly a low carb beer which he would never have chosen but also would not have eschewed under duress. And goddamn did he ever love a piece of cake, there in the end, when all else was lost.

I’ve had the ashes almost a year now, inside the pretty Chinese ginger jar we used as an urn, draped with a rosary, and on the shelf behind the couch in the living room. The kids don’t seem to know what it is and have never asked. I kind of figured Dad might like to be in the spot where all the hubbub occurs; he could watch, honestly not so different as a pile of ash as from how he was in his final years; quietly present as invisible kindness, hidden behind the ravages of 35 years of Parkinson’s and ultimately cancer.

His widow, my stepmom, has asked that I send her back the ashes. In a passive aggressive flurry of text messaging she communicated that - since I am not visiting as often as she would like and since I had to get off the phone to corral the kids and really only call when I’ve only got eight minutes to talk and since I overall suck at being an emotional support - she has procured the internment spot at San Carlos cemetery and wants the (effing) ashes back and can I just take 15 (measly) minutes out of my (busy) schedule to do this one (tiny) thing like going to the post office and mailing them (goddammit).

Problem being that according to US federal law, you can’t send ashes in an urn, and the urn would have to be broken to retrieve the ashes which were clearly funneled in through the narrow opening.

I avoided the job in stages; oddly unable for several weeks to pick up the urn at first, then unable for weeks more to open it, then – in a gust of courage last night, took it outside in a garbage bag and attempted to eggshell crack it on the driveway. But the urn busted into a hundred shards and ceramic dust and gashed open the ash bag inside, thus allowing a cloud of ashes to mushroom out of the garbage bag when I opened it, and to siphon out into the explosion of ceramic shards. I had avoided the ashes for weeks with odd squeamishness, and suddenly they covered my face; hands, the bag. Soapy fine, with tiny bits of bone, mixed in with the cracked ceramic. I stared at the mess and then resignedly drew an Ash Wednesday cross on my forehead.

Dad would have chuckled at the absurdity of his daughter scooping up his remains in the driveway. So I did my best. Majority of ashes in original urn bag, duct taped shut, put in secondary kitchen garbage liner unfortunately scented of febreze and stuffed in amazon box; quarter cup into manila envelope, dusty remains under maple tree; all on kitchen counter with beer and cake.

I still have to find those fifteen minutes to get to the post office. I can’t decide if I keep the bit in the envelope for myself. Or if I send it along in the box; find a way to siphon it back in with its ashen brothers. My dad broken into pieces in an attempt to deliver him as requested back to Joyce. And me, retaining part of him, secretly, from her.

Dad – what would you want? Does part of you stay with me?

She is the one who stayed with you through darkest hell and highest water; nursed you out of vibrant life to quiet early dawn death; wailed in fear and pain and loss upon finding your body – on the recorded Nest video on the baby cam in the room of your deathbed, we watched you die; saw her walk into the room and find you two hours later - “Oh David, David – Oh god David - NO!”.

I have chased you all my life. You were a psychologist and I became one. You converted to Catholicism and after you died I converted too. You found peace in pain and suffering and I learned firsthand that such is possible. I called you in a darkest hour and you said I would not be alone and we would do it together. In every partner I seek someone who could possibly be a man as you were. Thank you for covering my hands, for blessing me, bewitching me, bewildering me, branding me.

I’ll send you back; all of you. I honor you, I long for you, I miss you, I never had you, I lost you. But I do feel you, I pray to you; I know you better each day and year that passes.