Humor by John Christmann
A Pain in the Eulogy
I am a byproduct of The Greatest Generation, the generation loosely defined by Tom Brokaw as living through WWII, which necessarily places me somewhere in The Not So Greatest Generation.
Growing up as the sub-optimal progeny to The Greatest Generation, it was our job to question our parents and judge them based on our enlightened understanding of the world as shaped by the 60s, 70s, and Madonna.
And as parents, it is our job to pass on their wisdom so that our own children might at least have a fighting chance at being The Lesser Than Not So Greatest Generation.
And so it goes.
Last week was a bad week for my relationship to the Greatest Generation. Several of my closest friends lost a parent. And this follows a bad couple of months for many other old friends.
In times like these, I find it helpful to remember the laughter of the people who influenced me growing up, and to remind myself that for whatever their collective legacy, they were still very much human.
Big Al 1930 - 2010
Al could be a real pain in the ass. I think it made him feel alive.
Like the time a number of years ago, at an out-of-town Kentucky wedding of a mutual family friend, on a sweltering day in July, when Al boisterously proclaimed that Lexington was the armpit of the nation to a welcoming collection of people who proudly hailed from Kentucky.
That was when I was an adult, the day I first introduced Al to my wife. I explained in advance how Al had married my mom’s best friend after she was tragically widowed, how he had stepped in to raise her three kids who didn’t like him very much, how over time our families became intertwined and we came to tolerate him, and ultimately, appreciate him.
“Al loves a good time,” I warned her. But he can be kind of, well, overbearing."
Of course, when I nervously introduced her, Al was kind and gracious and he made me look like a complete idiot for even suggesting that he might be the slightest bit prickly. Like I said, he could be a real pain in the ass.
But later, during the reception, when he was drenched with sweat from gyrating on the dance floor amid all the young bridesmaids, he grabbed my arm and motioned across the room with his eyes. “Who is the curvy bird in the skirt?”
I followed his gaze across the room, where an attractive young woman in a tight dress was standing near the bar. Al was a hopeless connoisseur of the female figure.
“That would be my wife.” I told him.
But then, he already knew this. I caught the incorrigible twinkle in his eye even before he laughed out loud and moved back to reclaim his dance floor.
That’s another thing about Al. For a large man, he could dance really well.
As a kid I remember Al’s German Shepherd, Heidi. Whenever I came to visit, Heidi would throw herself in a barking frenzy against the fence by the back door and bare her menacing teeth. Heidi could be a pain in the ass too.
“Quiet, Heidi!” I would bark back, imitating Al. That dog would instantly stop and walk around in circles and lie with her head over her paws just waiting to be petted.
Inside the back door I would see Al in the kitchen preparing Heidi dinner using left over prime rib, no doubt from a dinner party the night before. Al shared his passion for food with everyone.
I don’t quite remember when Al matured in my mind from an oppressive parent to a fun-loving adult. But it might have been the summer he took over the garden behind his house.
Oh not, the tomatoes; his wife Donna watered those. Al tended the tall aromatic bushes near the back, the leafy ones that faded innocently into the greenery beyond. The ones planted not-so-surreptitiously by his teenagers.
That’s another thing about Al. He watched over all of us even when we were nothing but rebellious weeds in the garden. I think he looked forward to our outcome.
Here is something else about Al: he kept a sail boat moored in the harbor long after it made any sense, long after Donna died and his children begged him to get rid of it, long after he became bed ridden, long after he would ever cut through the waves and swear at the wind and the sea for not cooperating.
It is still there. I think even the elements thought Al was a pain in the ass. Even death.
A six foot, three hundred pound man takes up a lot of room, even when his dimensions are rounded downward. Such a man, when he goes, leaves a big hole in life.
Here is one more thing about Al. He left plenty of room for those of us he left behind to carry on.
And so it goes.
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