Closing a chapter on what we choose to crow about
All morning, I kept hearing that song “Funeral” by Phoebe Bridgers.
“I’m singin’ at a funeral tomorrow, for a kid a year older than me, and I’ve been talkin’ to his dad, it makes me so sad, when I think too much about it, I can’t breathe.”
A man’s funeral is today, only it’s not really a funeral. I suppose you would call it a wake, a get-together about a week after his death, at the home of one of his children. It’s not a church or a hall, no need for a priest or a rabbi, no sermon or song. A casual affair, or so I hope, because I’m wearing shorts.
To be fair, I would be wearing shorts if it were being held in a cathedral, just the same. It’s the middle of summer and we live at the beach. Shorts and flip flops are considered de rigueur anywhere at all times in this seaside community. Weddings, funerals, baptisms, and even high holidays, all welcome shorts and flips. It’s the way of the world, at least here.
“Last night I blacked out in my car, and I woke up in my childhood bed, wishin’ I was someone else, feelin’ sorry for myself, when I remembered someone’s kid is dead.”
Nothing about the story in the song relates to my life at the moment, but I suppose I’m drawn to the melancholy spirit of it, especially our sense of guilt at complaining about life when someone’s child is in the ground , or late husband.
It does make you think about whether or not it’s worth worrying about some of the things we worry about. We expect so much and receive so little that we are constantly walking around in a state of perpetual disappointment. It’s our ridiculous expectations that make us so unhappy. Alive is not enough.
“I have this dream where I’m screamin’ underwater, while my friends are wavin’ from the shore. I don’t need you to tell me what that means. I don’t believe in that stuff anymore.”
The song resonates even though I’m not even sure what I think it means, for me. I just know that whatever you think it is, it isn’t, and I guess that’s what it means. It’s a powerful song.
Everyone is wearing shorts.
I lasted all of an hour and change. I didn’t have anyone I wanted to talk to, not that I’m good with party small talk anyhow. There was nothing intriguing to drink and not much interesting to eat, and that’s not a criticism. It wasn’t supposed to be about me. I was just standing there, watching my wife make meaningless chitchat with other people I mostly don’t know. I live 150 yards away, so why am I standing here in the heat watching kids splash around in a pool, while the elderly, with ankles swollen, sit around fanning themselves and wondering when they can go home and watch reruns of shows they enjoyed when life made sense?
I wonder, sometimes, at things like this, what people think of me. I don’t even try to connect at parties and functions anymore. I have to be a little hammered to even bother to get into it with people, and even then, only if they can handle the conversation. Most cannot. You need a lot of planets to align for me to hit it off with a total stranger. Mostly, I don’t give enough of a shit to try. I’m not that curious about most people, as crazy as that might seem. I can be endlessly curious, but you have to show me something. I’m not going digging for it. So, sometimes, I wonder what they think.
I’m noticeable because I sport a long grey beard. There was a time when this would be little cause for notice, but these are not those days. We stick out, those of us who can grow a full beard and are willing to do so. I am not going to go unnoticed, and this is strange because I’m not otherwise drawing attention to myself. Then, if you meet me, I’ll bet I seem a bit boring or at least vacuous.
I have been told I have a resting face that kindly whispers, “Fuck off.”
I smile and offer handshakes, head nods, and other assorted social courtesies and gestures. I listen intently for names and then immediately forget them as if they never once met me. You could jump out from behind a shrubbery a few minutes later, put a gun to my head, give me ten seconds to come up with their names, or you’d blow my brains out, and I wouldn’t be able to come up with it. I’d have a better chance of simply taking the gun from you and shooting the person’s name I can’t remember. Put us both out of our misery.
This is what I think about when I see you at a public function. This is the scenario in my head. It’s not comforting. It’s full of entirely unnecessary anxiety. No one else even cares.
“Oh, Jesus, I can’t remember their name. I’ve known them forever. They would be so insulted to think I don’t know their name. Wait, what’s my wife’s name? Jane. Jane. Jeremy. Jane, this is Jeremy. Jeremy, this is my wife, Jonah. Sorry, your name is Jonah. This is Jane.”
I don’t need this shit.
If you’ll permit me a brief aside, I would like to talk about the swimming pool, you know, as a concept in modern Western society. I do not like a swimming pool. There’s really nothing about it I like, and I wasn’t always this way. I’m not entirely sure what it is, nor how or why this happened to me.
To me, this is like having a large outdoor bath that you invite other people to stand around and sometimes get in. I do not appreciate a bath. I’ve tried them. I didn’t enjoy it. Never once. Just as I don’t enjoy tomatoes even though everyone keeps telling me how I just haven’t had a good one yet, even though I live in the tomato capital of the world, surrounded by people who know better, and I’m nearly sixty. When did you think this epiphany was going to come about? I don’t like baths or tomatoes. My wife thinks she can change my mind about both of these things. She believes she still has time. She is wrong.
A swimming pool is a large, only slightly less filthy tub of dirty water. There’s nothing appealing about it to me. Lakes are worse with their muddy bottoms, and I can’t even really get into the ocean anymore. It’s too fucking big and way too full of hateful creatures.
The thing is, the only time I want to be wet is when I’m naked and alone with a bar of soap in my hand, attempting a very specific maneuver. Throw water on me when I’m dry and see how well that works out for you. You’ve never seen a being so vile, so repugnant, and so irredeemable in every manner of human decency, than you will surely witness should you splash water on me when I’m not prepared for it, which is never.
It’s really not something I enjoy.
Which is all fine, because swimming and immersive bathing are entirely voluntary activities, and even though people may urge you to join in, claiming how fine the water and how wonderful it all is, you don’t have to submit or concede to this sort of tomfoolery. You can resist, and the world will keep right on spinning. It won’t matter, however, because there is still the spectacle of children of all ages running roughshod around skull-splitting concrete that is conveniently wet and slick, missing the sides of the pool with their heads, mere inches to spare from certain death. This will excite the senses to the extreme with the potential for mayhem, all designed for fun and amusement, if the shock of it doesn’t kill you first. Medics are not standing by.
Ironically, if the booze flows free enough and the night goes on long enough, the adults will eventually disrobe and join in. You don’t want to be there for this part. You really don’t. Pools make me a little crazy, as do people, so I’d rather not. Nobody wants to end up the coroner’s unfortunate pool toy.
I think most people are pretty normal, meaning they fit well within the accepted social norms and more or less subscribe to what is expected of people in polite society. That’s really the definition of a majority, or even a society. Sometimes, in the circles I run, such as they are, I could be led to believe that almost everyone I know is a neurodivergent introvert of above average intelligence who sometimes struggles with social awkwardness. Isn’t that how everyone feels?
Apparently not.
You want to hear something really crazy? A lot of people love funerals. They happily go to weddings. They like get-togethers of all kinds. They enjoy parties. Parties, for fuck’s sake! They like talking shit to everyone, friends and strangers alike. It’s incredible. What do they get out of it? It’s hard to say for sure, but it would appear they enjoy each other’s company even if there’s nothing of substance going on. It’s more of a physical vibration they subsist on. They’re smiling because they’re happy, or at least drunk, but they’re enjoying themselves. Trust me on this.
I am not envious of these freewheeling extroverts. It looks exhausting, and I have no interest in being part of their joyful antics, nor am I resentful, wishing them to behave differently to fit my version of what is acceptable behavior. I’m relaxed in my acceptance that this doesn’t suit me, but pleases others. When did we decide that unity of thought was a valuable commodity? What a primitive frame of mind. Diversity is what has the power to evolve, adapt, and move forward. Never uniformity.
I still think they’re out of their minds, or dumb.
It rained all morning, off and on. I suppose that’s a contradiction of terms, but I planned to mow the lawn this morning, in time to shower and show up to the wake, but it kept raining. Now I have to mow tomorrow, which in my mind, is what I’m doing tomorrow. If I don’t dilly-dally, I can finish all the yard work in about two hours. I didn’t spend more than an hour at the wake today, and yet these two things occupied my entire weekend. How is that?
This is how I spend my life. My days are designated by what I am contracted to do that day, either officially or unofficially. I hate having obligations. I spent all morning thinking about what I had to do, and then soon after, lamenting what I had done. That’s not what an economist would call efficient or what a behavioral psychologist would call logical.
I have a client who asked to schedule a weekly status meeting, which is highly beneficial to me, especially given their busy schedules, and yet I found myself balking at committing to a specific time in the morning every Monday. I don’t need any new and unusual reasons for dreading Mondays. I’m trying to work through this in my mind. I spend too much energy thinking about things that may or may not ever materialize. That’s called worry, and I see no value in it. I’d rather not.
At one point, my wife was talking to her friend’s mother, and I watched as her great-grandson opened a cooler, grabbed a beer, and stuffed it into the red solo cup in his hand, then walked into the garage. He’s probably fifteen. We’ve known the boy since he was born. I have videos and pictures of him as a baby and toddler. He walked out a minute later with a full cup and a crushed can, which he proceeded to deposit in the recyclables around the corner. Then he rejoined his friends, standing back, casually drinking his beer.
The boy’s grandfather is the one who died. He was a bit of a Cock-O-The-Walk in life. Not always deservedly so, in my opinion, but probably no worse than most. I don’t think he ever really achieved his dreams and never quite lived up to what he thought he was capable of. I think this weighed heavily on him. That was the sense I got. A bit of quiet rage and resentment, mixed with a little naked jealousy and judgment. Maybe he saw the same in me. We never did quite get along.
I walked home not long after. I’d had two inches of a hoagie, a handful of potato chips, and one cream-filled pastry. I was ready to go home. As I walked past all the parked cars, I heard competing roosters crowing from my house and the neighbors’. One would crow, then the other would answer. Just to let us all know that they still mattered.
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