Here’s a phone call you never think about getting…ever.
“Hello?”
“Hi Mrs Ball, your husband’s ashes are ready for pick-up.”
This just gets more and more unbelievable, I thought.
“OK. Thank you. I will be there this afternoon”, I said.
I drove to the Mortuary, which ironically was the library when I was growing up, with a slightly sick feeling in my stomach. I walked in and back to the office. The Director had my four urns on his desk. My beautiful cousin, Michelle, owns MemorialGallery.com and had created the most incredible urns for us. There was one big one with a Raiders logo on it. That was the urn with half of Gordie’s ashes and it would be placed in a niche (which is basically a wall with compartments) at the cemetery in our town. The second urn contained the other half of his ashes and was a disposable one so that we could scatter them in a place with special meaning. The other two urns were tiny little replicas of the big Raiders urn…one for each of my sons. They had tiny little Raiders logos and an inscription that read:
My Dad
Daddy loves Nathan forever and ever
Each little urn contained a pinch of Gordie’s ashes. These were for the boys’ rooms. My Dad’s friend had recommended that we do this. It was one of those things I would never have thought of on my own and am so glad my Dad’s friend suggested it. The little urns were perfect. My cousin had done a spectacular job.
I was almost afraid of the urns.
“Um, are the lids on the urns screwed on tight?” I embarrassingly asked.
“Yes”, the Director answered, “they will not come off. Except on the disposable one that you will be scattering. Let me show you how it works”.
He showed me. Thankfully he did not really open it. I was not ready to see what was inside.
He put all four urns in a box for me and I carried it out to my car. I stood next to my car in the parking lot.
Where do you put urns in a car? I thought. The back? Hmmmm, that seems weird. The front seat?
I could not believe I was having this conversation in my head. I finally just put the box on the floor of the front passenger seat.
I drove like a Grandma as I headed home. Even though the Director told me that the lids would not come off, I was totally freaked out. I kept looking at the urns while I was driving to make sure they did not tip over. As I was sitting at a stop light, I realized that I did not want the big urns at my parents’ house. I was worried that they would fall off a shelf and break and there would be ashes all over the place….just like the movie “Meet the Fockers”. I changed direction and headed to the estate where we lived until Gordie died. Nobody was living there. Most of our stuff was still there. I would leave the big urns there. Gordie loved living at the Estate so I hoped this would be OK with him.
I parked the car in the driveway, carefully lifted the box of urns out of my car and walked up the stairs like I was carrying a newborn baby. I gently set the box down as I opened the door and turned off the security system. I picked the box up again and walked into the living room with the giant picture windows that looked out to the beautiful backyard. The room had a built in bookcase. I gingerly placed the big Raiders urn and the disposable urn on the bookcase. I angled the Raiders urn so that the Raiders logo was looking out the window at the backyard.
I am friggin’ nuts, I thought, he can’t see out of the urn.
I sat on our couch and looked at the urn for a long time.
My husband is in there. My hot, handsome husband with the awesome body is in a jar, I thought. How is this possible?
I sat on our couch in our old home and cried. And then I just lost control. I started screaming…at the top of my lungs.
NO! NO! NO!!! I hate you God!!! I hate you God!!!
I ran upstairs and threw myself on our bed. I buried my nose in his pillow. It still smelled like him. I cried ferociously. After weeks of quietly crying in my bed at my parents’ house, or on my runs, I just let it go. I was hysterical. It all came out. It was the first time that I had really been in a place where nobody could see or hear me. I laid there for nearly an hour and cried huge, body wracking sobs. When the crying started to subside, I sat up and noticed a moving box that some of my friends had put sheets and towels in the day after Gordie’s death. I slowly climbed off the bed and went to the box. The pile of anger in my belly ignited once again. I kicked the box. Once.
That felt good, I thought.
I kicked it again. And again. And another time. And then I was kicking the shit out of that box. It felt so good. I beat up on that box for a good 10 minutes. It was almost as therapeutic as a run. When I was finished, I went to the bathroom, grabbed some tissue, blew my nose and wiped my eyes. I went downstairs, got the box with the two little urns for the boys, turned on the alarm, and locked the door.
That night I showed the urns to the boys and placed them on the dresser in the room they were sharing at my parents’ house. Nathan loved that there was a Raiders logo on it. I showed him a picture of the big matching urn that I had taken before I left the estate so that he could see it was a tiny replica of the one that would be placed in the niche. Wyatt, who was age two, had really no idea what the hell the urn was.
Gordie did not stay long at the estate. His Mom hated the idea of him alone at the estate so I gave him to her to keep at her house until the niche was ready. Gordie loved his mom as much as he loved me and the kids so I know he was happy to be at her house.
A couple of months after he died, the niche was finally ready. My parents, his family, the boys, and a couple of my close friends met at the cemetery to place him in what I call “the double-wide”. It was a niche that fits two urns so that the boys could place me next to Gordie someday. Gordie, who took great pride in driving a pick up truck, wearing a White Trash baseball cap, and hated pretension probably loves that he’s in a double-wide. The cemetery caretaker opened it up and I tried to place the urn in the compartment.
Uh oh. It does not fit. It’s too tall.
I looked at our family and friends for help. Gordie’s brother came over to help. He was able to wedge it in…kind of tilted. But it was in. We could not help but laugh.
I would not spread the other half of Gordie’s ashes for another year. His family had originally requested that we spread them at the estate but I realized that was not the most special place to Gordie. I knew where he would want to be spread. In the summer of 2013, Gordie’s best friend, Greg, helped me spread the ashes. I will never say where we did it because it’s probably not really allowed but I know it’s what Gordie would have wanted.
I never, ever expected human ashes to look like what I saw come out of that disposable urn. Thank God Greg was with me because it caught me so off guard that I had to take a breath and nearly dropped the urn. Luckily Greg grabbed it. We spread the ashes together, said a prayer for Gordie and both shed a tear.
The boys and I visit Gordie’s double-wide just 2-3 times a year. The boys hate the cemetery and I totally get it. What little boy wants to be constantly reminded that his Dad is in a wall, instead of walking next to him? And every time we visit, I can hear Gordie whispering in my ear as we walk up the path to his double-wide: Please don’t force them to come here Stace. I’m not here anyway.