He said...
“Saints walk among us, although they do not know it”.
Other people spoke in greater detail, lovely memories all of them, but it all distills down to the simple truth that my grandma was a saint. As mentioned elsewhere, the harshest words I ever heard cross her lips was when she called my uncle’s adulterous ex-wife a ‘snotty snot’. She is one of just a handful of people who give me faith in humanity. Thomas Hobbes never met my grandma.
In a mid-western town of 900 people, some 200 attended the service. In my entire life I have never seen that church so full. People came from as far away as the West coast and, of course, Canada. I did not speak during the service. The opportunity was there, but those memories are mine and nobody in the room needed convincing as to what a wonderful women she had been.
The service also saw the creation of a new piece of family mythology. The Wagoners, with one exception, are a musical family. My dad (the eldest of the children), Uncle Tim and Aunt Teri all took their guitars to the front and performed ‘Angel Band’ from the ‘Oh Brother Where Art Thou soundtrack’. The night before while rehearsing, Thomas had insisted on strumming along while they rehearsed, so Tim took the little guitar Teri had given to Thomas and tuned it to open C. The idea hatched that, if Thomas wanted, he could go to the front of the Church to strum along with them. And he did. It was a funeral, so there are no pictures or film of the event. That’s fine. If anything it will simply make the event grow larger over time.
Like many others, I loved grandma dearly, and will miss her terribly.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Ah. Now I understand why writing about Iowa was hard.
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry, mate. Put a glass at the other end of the table; pretend I just emptied it, eh? You know I would if it was possible.
Best to you, and all yours. And the music for young Tom? Best thing you can do.
Was that "Grandma Wagoner don't keep no fours" Grandma Wagoner? When you were teaching us the card game 'golf' you pitched that voice so well and had that 'distant' look on your face so well that it made a real impact. That takes a lot of love and a lot of respect.
ReplyDeleteHeh. The secret code word on that last one was 'singer'
ReplyDeleteThats the one Bart.
ReplyDeleteI should also explain that grandma managed to touch so many lives as no more than a simple farmers wife. She worked for a bit in a bakery at a supermarket, and again in the high school cafeteria.
She loved music and children. Baked pies and cookies, and it was easy to make her laugh. She was a fundamentaly good person.