There is a Chinese Man in My Family

This weekend, I came home to be with family during my grandmother's funeral. During this time, there were several family-only events. At these events was a conspicuous tall Chinese-American man. It makes me think of several movies.

One, I Heart Huckabees. Maybe this man was a sign. My coincidence. But generally, I think of that movie after rewatching it recently (thank you, Justus) as philosophical drivel. I still appreciate it's ambition.

Two, Big Fish. This one is more relevant.

Meeting and greeting before the funeral was like the ending of Big Fish, when all of the father's fantasy (or not-so-fantasy) characters come to his funeral, and the stuff of legend and story becomes real. Not to mention the strong Southern bent on that movie . . . it's rooted in truth, that's for sure.

The point is that I found myself yesterday afternoon getting served by four older women that couldn't read this blog if they tried. Four women who live at the crossroads known as Chesterfield, SC at the Pine Grove Baptist Church, which boasts a sign boasting in turn "You think it's hot here?" But despite the God-fearing exterior, these four kind women had laid out a generous spread of fried chicken, macaroni and cheese, various vegetables, and most importantly banana pudding with chocolate chip cookies to ease the pain of burying a loved one.

These women were real. They had lived the stories I share about my grandparents. They saw World War II and the Kennedy Assassination. They've voted, time and time again. They watched the Civil Rights movement. All from their little crossroads that we in New England almost never think about.

And then we ventured upstairs and streams of octogenarians rolled in politely, their suits stiff and dresses flowered, their bright white hair an immaculately styled mess (especially the women). I met two brothers who looked so much alike that I thought: first that they were one man with Alzheimers, coming back through the greeting line to introduce himself again; then I thought he had split personalities; then I settled on their being twins; finally, like in Big Fish with the twin Chinese dancers, I saw them sitting in the same row -- nearly identical but not in the same body, one lsightly older than the other. I watched my mother laugh from her gut as she recollected memories of childhood with her next-door neighbor, whom she hadn't seen for 7 years and hadn't played with since she was 15. They talked about tossing homemade toothpick rafts into the ocean. I heard a woman cry over what my grandparents meant to her; another woman shared with my parents how much my grandfather's marital advice had meant to her and her husband of 31 years. I watched another husband place his hand gently on the back of his aging wife and rub in circles, the way I imagine I would like to do with my wife when we're no longer attractive to the outside world but always beautiful to each other, the way I hope love can and always will be.

In short, I watched stories turn into people and people turn back into stories after the ceremony ended and everyone turned on their headlights and processed to the graveyard, only to disappear back into their separate worlds. I reconnected with cousins living only hours away from my overcomplicated schedule. I sat on porches and held cats who trusted me with their fragile frames.

For a weekend, I watched theory and philosophy and theology spill out from intellectual minds who held onto those ideas more or less on faith and become verifiably real on the church floor. I was reminded that goodness and memory are ethereal only for so long, and that they do have roots in a concrete reality, that there are real people with real lives who savor and cherish what to many of us are only in our heads and hearts.

In the end, it all comes down to my grandfather's vaguely-religious and moreso philosophical words, repeated by his son who shares his name but who spoke on behalf of all of us:

"The best sermons are lived, not preached."

And at the end of it all, while we were still standing within sight of the gravesite that holds them both, I watched a disinterested grave crew close and lower a coffin that was as hollow to them as a recycling bin, working with the speed and precision of a pit crew so they could get home to dinner and their wives.