Powder Blue Suits

People say things at funerals.

They say things like; “I’m sorry for your loss”, or “He was a great man, or “If there is anything I can do…”

I’m watching my uncle say respond to the words that people say when people have no idea what to say.

“We expected it”

It’s true. We knew for a long time that my grandfather was going to pass. He was suffering from a myriad of health problems and had been in hospice for the past week. I had been thinking about how I would be traveling and what it might be like to say goodbye to the man who raised me. However, when the call came from my mother to let me know that it had happened, the tears still fell. I was glad for the light rain the windshield of my truck. It seemed appropriate.

Now here I was, days later, sitting in a funeral home trying to work up the nerve to say goodbye.

I was here once before. It was 30 years ago. I was a child then, sitting next to my grandfather dressed in his powder blue suit. I was on one side and my sister on the other. My mother was on the comfy couch up front where they sit widows at funerals. My grandfather was like a strong tower keeping these little kids who had just lost their dad from blowing away. We moved in with my grandparents after the funeral and I spent the next 10 years learning how to be a man from him.

He, in very real terms, became my father.

Life has a particular irony sometimes. Today I sat next to my sister in the same place I left my father. This time, there was no strong tower between us. He was up front. The coffin was powder blue, like the suit he wore 30 years ago.

He picked the color.

It just makes sense that he will leave this world dressed in a powder blue suit.

After the minister said all the words that ministers say and the people began to mill about saying the things that feel necessary, I walked alone to the casket. I found myself wondering what I was to say.

How do you say goodbye to the only father you ever really knew?

How do you say goodbye to the man who taught you to fish, or laugh, or how to be strong for your family, or how to work hard for others, or how to add “facts” to stories to make them a bit more interesting, or whistle, or fix stuff, or dream you can be anything?

How do you let go of a man who was proud of you? Who loved you?

This man made me love Hank Williams, classic television, space, and going for walks.

How do you say goodbye to the man who taught you how to be a man?

I paused there with him.

I place my hand on the cold, hard case near where I thought his hands might be.

“Thank you” will have to do for now.

I walked out into the unforgiving heat of a St. Louis summer. My clothing became instantly wet as my east coast body reacted to the weight of the air around me. It dawned on me that I have my own work to do, people to love, stuff to fix, songs to sing, stories to tell, and maybe even a few fish to catch.

I reached in my pocket and felt the silver compass that I had brought with me. When I was a kid I used to love to go into his room and play with that compass. As I was getting dressed today I wandered into his room and saw it on his dresser. I put it in my pocket.

It reminded me that I still need someone to show me the right direction…and that there are people looking at me wondering which way to go.

I have little boys who need to be taught how to be men. It’s my turn to be a strong tower.

I just wonder if I’ll need a powder blue suit.