It wasn't at all like I thought it'd be. I called A's assistant, D, who has been taking care of J's dog Dillon while J was in the hospital, to ask about Dillon; she said Dillon's doing about the same (he's on a lot of pain medicine for his cancer). I also mentioned that if she needed any help, to let me know. She said that LR was going to be at A's house to work on it before A's return home -- this was on Tuesday -- and said if I had any time that I could be utilized. I called LR and she told me she was going to "tornado" through the house. I kind of assumed that meant she was going to clean, but when I got there, she was rearranging stuff. Come to find out, she was going to rearrange the furniture and the artwork and knick-knacks, everything in every room so that it didn't remind A of J, so that she didn't have anything to make her aware of his absence in her home. (This was actually A's idea, I think, which is really kind of brilliant.)I was put in charge of getting all of J's medicines out of the house; I started in his personal bathroom (which LR made an obvious point of not calling it that anymore -- ditto for his personal closet, it was now being called "the bedroom closet," which seemed a little weird, but okay, that's fine), put every Rx bottle with J's name on it in a garbage bag, along with face masks and latex gloves and dry mouth toothpaste, etc. I also put the portable potty chair in the back of my truck so that it could be dealt with later, donated to a hospice or something, perhaps.
After that, I started cleaning off all that covered J's desk in what would now be called "the sitting room" (actually, every room had a sitting area in it), boxing up CDs and post-it notes, pens, headphones, etc.
Before long, other people started arriving -- mostly people from the Dance group that we all belong or belonged to -- everybody given a job by LR as soon as they walked through the front door (unless they had a specific project in mind, like K, who arrived with white sage and set about "cleansing" every nook and cranny in the house).
At one point, when there were well over a dozen people working on moving furniture, boxing the contents of "the bedroom closet," dusting, vacuuming, I clashed with someone on what I thought would be the next part of the job I would do. It wasn't a major thing, just somebody saying, "Don't do that because I have to do this," even though it was the second part of a job I'd started when I first arrived (and was the only helper involved). I guess what annoyed me a little was that he said, "Why don't you go do this instead." It wasn't so annoying that I lashed out or anything, it just made me want to be done and go home. I had been there a few hours by this time.
From that point on -- while I found myself in charge of organizing the laundry room which is connected to the garage, and having to constantly move boxes from other parts of the house that people put in the place I had cleared away for a zippered closet someone was supposedly going to purchase at some point during the day for J's hanging clothes -- I kept looking for my opportunity to leave. But there was so much to do. And I kept jumping onto other projects, and kept having people "assigned" to help me, and they were usually people I liked hanging out with. So I didn't go and I didn't go, and then it was suddenly seven o'clock and someone said, "A's here," and I looked around, amazed that everything had actually come together, because not thirty minutes before that moment, there were piles of bedding and piles of furniture and stacks of artwork that didn't look like they would find their proper places or hiding places by the time A arrived, but they did.
I was in the garage when she walked into the house. I thought about sneaking out the back gate, not because I didn't want to see or say anything to A, but because it was such a huge group of people; I thought she might be overwhelmed. (I should have known it was exactly the thing A loved; I should have been honest with myself that it was the kind of thing that would more likely overwhelm me!) I decided instead to stick my head into the front room and give a hug. And as soon as I did, A's son M saw me and came over to hug me, bursting out into loud sobs as he came. We hugged for a long time; A came and joined us. I had met M at the hospital (and in Austin) a couple of times around J's illness -- he and his sister L both live in San Francisco now. I guess they had just been talking about me or something; M said, "We were just saying we couldn't wait to throw out all of J's medicines!" I told him I understood and had already taken care of it.
People arrived with food (of course) and a couple of hours later, I was still there, drinking wine, visiting with J's brother P, A's infant grandbaby W, and other people I know from the Dance group and from other places in J's life. It was a pretty spectacular event.
Every day since then -- and ongoing through tomorrow -- they are sitting Shivah at A's with the family (her kids, their partners, J's brother and father). I decided to make some brownies to take today. I always used to take J brownies when I visited, because he loved them, and because he always needed more calories. I found a recipe online for black bean brownies that I wanted to try. I set out to make them yesterday and had to go to the store twice, had to shell pecans for forever, and used almost every mixing bowl in the house -- the process took four hours in all (and then I couldn't even sample them until this morning because they have to set in the refrigerator overnight because they're so moist and crumbly).
But it was worth it. I had half of one this morning -- S had the other half -- and right now I feel like I made a mistake by putting that in my body at 7:30 a.m.! I feel all speedy and hyper (the recipe has instant coffee in it, and lots of black beans). It's surprising that they doesn't taste beany at all. The taste is very similar to flourless chocolate cake; they are quite yummy. Here's a link to the recipe.
Sunday is J's memorial. It's an all-day affair. I'm sure there will be a special Dance in his honor, but I doubt I'll go to that (I've been enjoying going to Austin Dharma Punx lately). From 2:00-4:00 the service is at the alumni building on the UT campus (J was a professor). After that, from 5:30 on, there will be BBQ at a place called the Salt-Lick Pavilion (in a town thirty miles from here called Driftwood, Texas), with LZ Love providing musical entertainment. There will be an open mike there as well.
