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She sat with face of stone. Lines had appeared overnight on her tear streaked face, or so it seemed. Still and silent the box rested too lightly upon her lap. The changing landscape outside the limo's window went unnoticed. The whispered chatter of her companions in grief on this journey were unheard. The box, too light, too small had become the only focus in a world spinning wildly out of control.
Thirty-one years. Time was funny. Thirty-one years was short if it was an entire lifespan. It would seem eternal if one were imprisoned or ill for that length of time. For most people, it was a fleeting number of memories. The wedding in Acapulco ("We're either married or licensed to fight bulls, we don't speak Spanish."), the children (his, hers and, in time, theirs), grandchildren, holidays, birthdays, anniversaries....all moving by at a fair clip. One day you look in a mirror and notice the silver and lines. You note the children, once a loud soundtrack of your life are now a voice on the other end of a phone call.
There were the fights and hard times. There was the love and passion too. There were celebrations large and small. Those "normal" days of no import. The unspoken comfort of having someone to share it all with. Those words, "richer or poorer, sickness and health, good times and bad," were LIVED not just recited.
The box should weigh more. How could the essence of someone be so small, so light? How CAN a life be reduced to ash? All the pain and joy, dreams and fears to bits of bone?
The memory yet fresh and clear show a vibrant being, a force to reckon with. THIS person had a HISTORY, had accomplished things, had dreamed of more. There were tears and laughter, impassioned tirades over important issues! No wallflower here! This man was a firebrand with a touch of the revolutionary, a watchdog for social justice and political fairness. For all his occasional forays into hyperbole he had paid for the right to speak with his blood on Hamburger Hill in Korea. The PTSD that no medications could ever cover and the medals given by a "grateful government" gave witness to that toll. It left him hating war and its aftermath, distrusting the governments and policies that send humans to kill and be killed. It left him with a fear of eroding values in the nation he loved. He was an idealist who believed that one voice crying in the wilderness could still bring about more than just wet sand.
How could all of that now ride so lightly on one small lap? Once that same lap had held but the head of this man, tender moments of love and comfort. Now all that remained of him fit there. It was wrong, unnatural, obscene.
How could the entire personality, mind, hopes, fears, history, emotions of ANY person ever be reduced to a box or covered with a slab of marble etched with a few terse lines?
Nature itself has to be shouting, "Impossible! Not logical." Energy never disappears, merely changes so how then can a man just cease to exist?
A line of cars follow. She knows they are there and it matters yet does not. Right now it is only the suddenly frail woman and the too-small box, that is the entire world.
The journey is both too long and yet too short. The urge to take the box and flee is great yet where would she go and to what purpose? It is but a box, not HIM, not really. He is gone. But that cannot be true either.
The Universe itself rebels at the idea that this is the sum total of it. All a man's life but memories and dust? Makes no sense if that is all there is. Why love or dream or toil and suffer if THAT is the totality of a life? To what end?
Face of stone staring ahead to a new, empty feeling, slightly frightening future. A box of ...what exactly(?)...on her lap. Her husband, companion, friend. NO, he couldn't fit in such a small container. He was too many things for that.
The limo stops and words are spoken. Prayers and Psalms dutifully read. Canned taps are played mournfully and strangers present a folded flag with "Thanks" from a president he loathed.
Soon enough the light box is gone and the small gathering disperses to let in the next group of bereaved with their boxes small and large yet somehow NEVER large enough.
Loved ones gather and talk of past days. Laughter is shared and tears, food, heartfelt hugs, the things of community, of family.
She smiles, laughs and, when unobserved, stares into the future, alone. She would discard the black dress she wears this day. It has seen too much service of late. A mother, a grandson, and now a mate. It makes no sense that a garment should weigh more than that box. Another wrong note in the discordant symphony of this day.
There had to be more, nothing else made sense. No one, no matter how short a life or shallow the person could have this as the abrupt punctuation to their existence. Ash? Bone? A memory in the minds of those who knew them and then, when they pass to ash and bone, nothing? It defies logic to think so. Like the idea that such as HE could ever be reduced to that light box.
~fin