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Sept. 9: I’m sure that times will come when I am more sad, but since the funeral on Friday, I’ve just been tired.  So very sleepy.  I feel like the pool that is my well of energy had the plug at the bottom pulled out, and I am calmly feeling the water pour out.  I’m almost looking forward to it all draining out, leaving me languid and limp.  Or maybe that’s already happened.  In any case, it’s going to take me a little while to physically, mentally, and emotionally recover from the last month.

I already miss Mom lots.  I just changed my American Girl, Kirstin’s, clothes from her summer to her fall outfit, and I have a painful pit in my stomach knowing that I can’t talk to Mom about it.  She always liked hearing about what clothes Kirstin was wearing.  On the other hand, maybe now I don’t have to tell her.  She just knows in whatever way she is right now.

Maretta’s future mother-in-law, Marilyn Zilic, sent me the following prayer when we were at HospiceCare.  I had heard it before, and it is a nearly perfect interpretation of where I feel like Mom is right now:

Hopi Prayer

Do not stand at my grave and weep.
I am not there.
I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glints on snow.
I am the sunlight on the ripened grain.
I am the gentle Autumn’s rain.
When you awaken in the morning hush,
I am the swift uplifting rush
of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry.
I am not there.
I did not die.

Sept. 9: I feel so relieved and peaceful now that the various visitations and church services for Mom are complete.  As we drove home from the cemetery on Friday afternoon, I felt limp and relaxed and so very relieved and emotionally drained…quite a mix of emotions.
From Saturday, September 1 through the morning of September 6 I had been working harder and more focused-ly than I usually consider possible.  We all so wanted the events on Thursday and Friday to do Mom justice.  We wanted to honor and celebrate and mourn her in a way that would help people get a whole picture of the person she is (was…I’m still working on the past tense thing).
Pictures of the Bethel visitation and prayer service and the reception at Terry’s are in the gallery.
Pictures of the St. Peter’s visitation, funeral, and the burial are also in the gallery.

On Thursday, I think we were all surprised at how many people poured through Bethel for the visitation.  The room was absolutely full of beautiful flowers (see many of them in their own album in the gallery).  Several teachers from DeForest were there, many, many of Mom’s relatives, friends from far and near, oodles of Mom’s co-workers from American Girl, even more of Dad’s colleagues from the Republican Party…it was stunning.  And exhausting.
I thought the prayer service that Pastor White was nice.  Mom would have really liked the cloth that was used to cover her casket.  It was Williamsburg-esque.

After the prayer service, we headed back to Terry’s for a yummy dinner prepared by Lisa.  It was nice to have more of a social opportunity to interact with some of the people who had traveled to town to help remember Mom.  And the delicious desserts were an added bonus.
I drove home that night exhausted and in some degree of disbelief that we had the full actual funeral to get through the next day.

Friday morning dawned gray and rainy.  We met at St. Peter’s at 8:30 and saw that Ryan Funeral Home had again done a nice job of setting up all the tables of memorabilia to showcase Mom’s rich life.  Mom’s casket was again open and set up in the center of St. Peter’s church.  It was quite strange to be in a space that was so very familiar and yet doing something that felt so bizarre and in some ways so terribly wrong…saying goodbye to our mom.

Just a note on the open casket concept.  I think it’s nice that people get an opportunity to see a person when they are dead.  I can imagine that it is hard to really accept that someone is dead when the last time you saw them they were fully alive and healthy.  But I really am weirded out by the artificialness of the embalmed body.  For me (and I know that I’m a weird biologist-who-likes-the-grittiness-of-life-and-death), I’d much prefer the old fashioned parlor viewing that occurred right after the death.  And for a burial, I’d love to have a green burial.  I like the idea of washing and tending to a body when the person has died, but I didn’t at all like seeing Mom the way she was made up and posed in her casket.  It just didn’t look or feel like her.  And I found that to be pretty disconcerting.  It also made it a little easier to let go, though.  I don’t feel like any of Mom is left in her body.  What made her her has gone elsewhere, so saying goodbye and burying her was easier that way.

I thought that the funeral service was really nice.  I keep finding myself humming the hymn “How can I keep from singing,” which we sung half way through.  My favorite aspect of the whole set of events was the time of sharing that came after the Catholic mass.  My sweet brother Joe helped to MC, and several people spoke.  I plan to get electronic versions of their comments so I can share them on this website.  Dad started it out, followed by Mary Read, Nancy McElmurry, Paula Kopp, Terry Haller, Heather Lerner, and last, Joe.  For me, it was incredibly moving (I went through a pile of Kleenex), joyful, and painted a full picture of my wonderful mom.  I hope that those who attended left feeling like they knew and loved her better.

We had a luncheon at St. Peter’s following the reception.  I had asked that some of Mom’s crowd-pleasing dishes be made, including tatertot casserole and macaroni & cheese & tuna & peas.  I also figured that Mom would have really liked lemon squares made with real lemons, brownies, and Minute Maid lemonade.  After the sad and joyous funeral, it was nice to wander around and talk with some of the many people who had come to pay respects to my mom.

Sometime during the funeral, the sun came out, and the day turned beautiful.  A somewhat smaller group processed from St. Peter’s Church, up Highways CV and 51 to the Windsor cemetery.  There wasn’t a cloud in the sky above us when they moved Mom’s casket from the car onto the grave site.  I stayed until the casket was lowered into the ground and the vault was lowered down as well.  Dad stayed until she was all tucked in.

It’s a beautiful cemetery.  There are photos in the gallery from our visit out there earlier in the week.  It will be a nice place to visit.

Margot and I first met in the fall of 1968. We had one of those friendships that just happens and is a gift from God. It was like we had always been friends. Over the years whether we talked daily or not for two months we always picked up where we left off.
I lived in the Episcopal Church Rectory and  had to answer the phone either St. Andrews Rectory, Mary Culver Speaking or just Mary Culver speaking. Ashland was a small town and I was amazed that anyone wanted to be best friends with a Pk ( PREACHERS KID. ) That is a prelude of what I am about to say.

To everything there is a season. A time to be born and a time to die.Margot and I used to say this to each other often (probably because it was a hit song at the time)Little did we know what a true saying it was and is and how it would impact our lives over the years ahead. As I was driving home the other evening I heard a bit of a song by Celine Dion. I am what I am because you loved me. It describes the impact Margot had on my life.
I would like to read to you Margot’s own words to me from our senior year book.

Dear Mary Culver Speaking,
To whom am I speaking?Oh, she’s not home right now. I see. Well, would you deliver a message for me? Thank you.
Tell her Dearly called ( my mother named us Dearly and Darling. I always wanted to be dearly and thought my mother liked Margot better).
I wanted to make Christmas cookies one friday night and was wondering if she was going to the game. If not perhaps she would like to take a walk through Northland College, fall down the hill,paint “70” on the football field with a christmas tree or on the railroad trestle and sign our names,pick lilac sand talk about life and death. ( If we don’t get waylaid by a Hummer).Or perhaps she would rather go for a ride in her car, whether it is a fun ride or just runs. ( to those of you who didn’t grow up in a small town a fun ride was going over an elevated railroad track to fast and getting that tickly feeling in your stomach and a run was making the circuit up and down the main street in town)
We could always go to a party….(.this is my memory…the only time I ever saw margot get mad was over the senior lock in at the Elks club.My parents were leaning toward yes we could go and hers were leaning to ward no. Margot wore wooden clogs in those days and she threw a fit and kicked her foot. the clog went flying off and to this day I bet there is still a dent in that ceiling.)
anyhow, we could go to a party…..like the street dance or Sue Leaky’s party or a pre Sweethearts Ball party or a surprise birthday Party.(I threw Margot a surprise Sweet 16 sleepover)If she would rather, we could go downtown (it is a Friday night after all) and look through all the stores, then go ToJans and get some material and I could make her a formal. And we could always go on a picnic….ask her whether she Prefers Prentice Park,Lake Park or Copper Falls. Maybe she would like to sleep over….we could ask Josh ( my 80 lb german shorthaired pointer)to join us…..and we could giggle and talk and laugh and fall asleep holding hands, ( do you know that whenever we stayed with each other that is just how we went to sleep no matter what our age),unless, of course,we slept outside, in which case we would have iced tea and soda crackers.
I hope she is able to do something and isn’t laid up with a ripped off toenail or a lost appendix or a tumor in her wrist.

Have her call me,won’t you? I don’t want to lose touch. And tell her this is lovely weather if it doesn’t rain. She’ll understand.

Love,

Margot

Rest in peace my friend…..

Terry Haller Remarks

I am Terry Haller, and I am a close friend of the Babler family.  In fact, I have been like a second father to the kids.  Imagine a strange man come over to their house every day for a period of 30 years – and they never once called the police!  Indeed, their family was my family too, and Margot was the central focus of that world.

One of the greatest American playwrights was Thornton Wilder, and he was actually born in Madison in 1898.  He lived here with his family where his father was editor of the Wisconsin State Journal.  His family’s home was located on the same land where my Maple Bluff home was located, and in 1984, when I purchased that home, one of the first things Margot and I decided to do was to tear out some moldy pine paneling in the basement recreation room and discard it.  We later discovered to our horror that this paneling had been transplanted from the Wilder’s living room when the latter home was torn down in 1926.

Wilder’s greatest play, Our Town, was also Margot’s favorite.  This play is far more than a staple of high school theater departments.  Indeed few if any works of literature have better served to illustrate the relationship between everyday life and the eternal.  The play tells the story of a normal family in the simple days of early 20^th century rural America.  The first part deals with daily life, the second with love and marriage, and the final part with death and remembrance.  It is from the third part of this, Margot’s favorite play, that I read now.

Emily Webb, who has just died in childbirth, asks the God-like Stage Manager from her grave to relive her twelfth birthday.

This wish is granted, but the experience is too much for Emily.  She cannot bear to deal with the mundane details of everyday life, knowing how precious they actually are and knowing what the future holds:

MR. WEBB: Offstage
Where’s my girl?  Where’s my birthday girl?

EMILY: In a loud voice to the stage manager
I can’t.  I can’t go on.  It goes so fast.  We don’t have time to look at one another.

She breaks down sobbing

The lights dim on the left half of the stage.  Mrs. Webb disappears.

I didn’t realize.  So all that was going on and we never noticed.  Take me back – up the hill – to my grave.  But first:  Wait!  One more look.

Good-by, Good-by, world.  Goody-by, Grover’s Corners … Mama and Papa.  Good-by to clocks ticking … and Mama’s sunflowers. And food and coffee.  And new-ironed dresses and hot baths … and sleeping and waking up.  Oh earth, you’re too wonderful for anybody to realize you.

She looks toward the stage manager and asks abruptly, through her tears:

Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it? – every, every minute?

STAGE MANAGER:
No.

Pause

The saints and poets, maybe – they do some.

EMILY:
I’m ready to go back.

She returns to her chair besides Mrs. Gibbs.

Pause

And so, on a rainy September afternoon, Emily Webb, having died well before her time, returns to her grave and to the ages.

Farewell, Margot.