Angels and Coffins: July 6, 1999

Preparing for the funeral of my husband of 15 years...

  The walls were a shade too dark for tan, a shade too light for brown. The dimness of the room struck me. For a moment I wondered if it was a mood-lighting effect or if the gloominess of this whole venture had dimmed my eyes -- perhaps my friend Traci, keeping step with my slow movements, was seeing a more vibrant scene. I searched the walls and ceilings for the light source and noted the heavily tinted blue sconces in the corners of the room. Okay, the lighting made sense.

   I needed sense because my even having to be in that room was such a bizarre thing. The salesman (although I believe he called himself my bereavement assistant or some other politically correct euphemism) pitched the soft silk lining of that one’s interior and the air-tightness of this line of products over here, as I stared at one sconce in the farthest corner of the room. Its light flickered; I knew it would be burning out soon. The light would be no more. Just like Kenneth. But with my dear husband, I had missed the flickering warnings. Tears welled in my eyes and one spilled down my cheek. I suddenly realized I was moving when I bumped into the rails of a high-gloss silver casket.
   “Excuse me,” I said, more to the casket than to the salesclerk.
   “No harm done,” the clerk replied cheerily, smiling broadly as he continued his coffin chatter. I looked from box to box, from the most ornate: a pink 20-gauge steel casket surrounded by bursts of delicately-crafted rose sculptures; to the most expensive: a solid cherry wood with a thick stripe of real gold snaking around its middle; to the plain pine boxes -- least expensive, least attractive. The knot in my stomach twisted sharply as I realized I probably couldn’t afford much better than pine.

   “Now this pure copper casket is one of the finest caskets on the market today,” the salesman said, moving in closer to my side and pointing to a shiny, fancy box on my left. For the first time since he led me through this door, I tuned him in. “The brushed copper exterior is quite striking, and the exquisite champagne velvet interior is pure class. It comes with solid copper swing bar hardware and a fully adjustable bed.”
   My eyebrow raised as he finished. “Fully adjustable bed?” I coughed twice deliberately. I had come so close to making a joke about the idiocy of giving a corpse an adjustable bed. Humor was my shield and my sword, but I dropped it in time. No, not now. Nothing funny here.
   Rounding the corner to the next row, I found the one; I found Kenneth’s coffin. I would venture to say that not many of them were ever made, not before and not since. Further I would guess that few others have ever chosen it. But I saw him in it -- not literally lying on the deep blue satin bedding within its frame; rather I saw his spirit portrayed in the totality of the scene before me. Yes, this was different from any other in the room, and unlike any I had ever seen in my life, even in the movies. It was, in its way, beautiful.
   The outside was an actual photographed scene, mostly sky and clouds, with a strip of land at the bottom, which rose into a small hill on one end. Three crosses stood on the hill. Although the religious symbolism was not completely lost on me, I didn’t want it for the ground. I wanted it for the sky. A partly cloudy sky was Kenneth’s favorite screen saver. As I walked the length of the coffin, touching the edges lightly and studying every white puff floating off into the deep blue background, I could see my husband up there in Computer Heaven, updating an ancient machine, backing up God’s databases, and preparing to single-handedly forestall the impending Y2K computer disasters for all of heaven and earth.
   The concern about price and the hows and whys disappeared as I imagined him lying there, dressed all in white, and imagined his children, my strong, brave boys, looking at him and seeing God’s Computer Warrior Angel, ready for action. I had no choice.
   “This one,” I said, which made the sixth and seventh word I had uttered in more than an hour, and with the decision came the tears, lots and lots of tears, as Traci held me tightly and the salesman started writing.

Author's Note

I am not sure what category this falls into. If you would know, or if you think it has any publishable merit, please let me know.

Reviews

[lori c]

wow, you did well with this and i am glad not to see it crammed into poetic form. though a bit morbid until the later third. here we begin to see kenneth through your eyes, and even find a slight smile in the midst of all this ickiness of Duty. again, i see a great cathartic piece, an essay, of coming to terms on another level. publishable ? perhaps. but that decision is better left to someone else. i really liked this.