Today had he lived, my father would be celebrating his hundredth birthday. I’ve forgotten the day he died, but the day he was born is now firmly lodged in there. I used to get confused as to whether it was the 15th or the 16th, but since he’s been gone, I, strangely, can’t forget it.
Dad’s ashes are in the lake at the foot of the Peaks of Otter and up among the rocks on Skyline Drive. I think we sprinkled them in a few other places, too. He sat in a box on top of my sister’s refrigerator for years listening to his grandchildren growing up. He probably enjoyed it. I wonder just how much is even left underground of the rest of the family. Bones?
When his sister, my Aunt Helen, passed away over a year ago, my sister and I decided to add a memorial stone for him alongside hers in the Hester burial plot in Lynchburg. It feels right, somehow, that his name is among the rest of that most recent group of Hesters. He isn’t physically there, but maybe somebody will walk past the plot, years from now, and think, oh look, here they all are. Those people Richard wrote about are right here, six feet down and, that’s his dad.
The pandemic created a supply-chain slow-down on headstones, so we still don’t have them. A few days ago, I finally got the proofs for them emailed to me to approve before they started carving them. His middle name, unfortunately, was spelled wrong, so I had to send them back to be corrected. I’m sure that will add to the delay. You’d think that a stone headstone would last forever, but it doesn’t. They only seem to be good for a couple of hundred years. They wear away. For them to last and keep legible, you’d have to bury them.
All the writing I’ve been doing about my family started out as a way for me to get to know my father better. I thought that putting his life and writing in order would be a way into who he was. Has it worked? I think it’s turned into something else entirely. I’m not quite sure what that is, yet. Do I know him better? Hmm. I can imagine talking about all of what I’ve uncovered and put together with him and him being very interested. Maybe that’s enough.
None of us last very long. Even a hundred years, in the grand scheme of things, is an absurdly short blip. You can easily fit four generations into a century, five if each new one starts having a family young. The ones at the end of the century don’t usually know all that much about the ones at the beginning. Time just keeps on trucking.
I don’t say that to be morbid or depressive. I think that it’s good to remember that our time is finite. We should live a good life and love as many people as we can. We shouldn’t be cruel, and we shouldn’t vote for dicks.
We are in danger of losing our way. I can see it in the news. I can see it in our politics and in the rise of corporate monopolies. Can it be fixed? We all need to take a deep breath, step back and let our shoulders drop. It’s time to regain the innocence and trust most of us had as kids.
I am grateful for the life that my father helped create for me. It may not have seemed like it to me all the time when I was growing up, but I truly couldn’t have asked for a better father. He always made me think. Thanks, Pop. And Happy Birthday.
We’re working on your stone. I promise. We won’t forget.
There must be something afoot in the Universe. Right before I opened your letter, I had just read my Thursday delivery of Eric Zorn’s (former Chicago Trib columnist and now Substack) Picayune Sentinal He opened with the following:
“Birthday observances should not be just for the living and the famous
Earlier this month, I made note of the 117th anniversary on June 6 of the birth of my paternal grandfather Max Zorn, from whom I appropriated the title of this newsletter. Two weeks from today will mark the 94th anniversary of the birth of my late mother-in-law, Tobey Wolken.
As I think more about these dates and these important people in my family’s life, I’m regretting that we too often stop observing or even remembering the birthdays of those who have died. And this hastens the inevitable fade nearly all of us make after death into obscurity.
I’m resolving to put onto the family calendar the birthdays of not just our living family members — my dad turns 92 next Monday — but also the important ones gone on before; the ones to whom we cannot send cards or make phone calls but whom we should pause to remember, consider and thank. Maybe in a family email or group text. Maybe in a toast at the evening meal. Or maybe in a moment of silent reflection as you gaze at that square on the calendar that once meant so much.
We do it for important figures in a nation’s history. Why not for grandparents, parents, departed siblings and other close relatives who are important in our family histories? Give each one his or her own day again.
I don’t want to forget to remember all of them.”
For the record, My grandfather Lyman Lamb was born on July 5th. It is family lore that he always quipped, “Have a 5th on the 4th”. 😉
Happy birthday, Pop. You have a delightful son who has endeared you and your family to me.