Well, the funeral is over. What else is there to say?

I saw a lot of people for the first time in years today, many for the first time since my grandmother passed.  The funeral itself was short and informal.  My mom spoke, then Mike and I got up together, followed by two of Dad’s siblings, Eric and Margi, and my dad’s good friend Rich. There were a few stories I heard for the first time, and part of me wished I could’ve heard my father’s comments on them

I no longer have a dad. That feels so incredibly weird.

After the funeral many headed over to my parents’–or I guess I should start saying “my mom’s”–for a reception.  There was a wide mix of people, and of course there were was a lot of laughter and crying paired with plenty of eating and drinking.  Kids in costumes were running all over the place, and in many ways there was more life in the house over the course of the afternoon than I think I ever saw there.  (Well, maybe except for the time my brother threw that huge drinking party when my parents were on vacation, but that’s a different story for a different time. At least no walls got bashed in this time around.)

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The house was busy last night as well.  My mom’s friend Darlene was over, as were Ben, Beth and their kids.  Mike’s plan for dinner was scuttled after he learned at least 1/3 of those around for dinner didn’t like shrimp, and so we ordered out from Fatzo’s and ended up having a good time anyway.

After everyone had cleared out or gone to sleep–including Lisa and Mathias, who were back at the hotel–I headed back to my mom’s and she, Mike and I just stood around talking for a few hours.  We talked about all kinds of things–the trip our family made to the Packer’s SuperBowl in New Orleans, Mike planting his Delta 88 out in the middle of a farm field, Dad’s early exploits while working for a scorched-earth car dealership in Green Bay, Dad’s and my trip across the country in a 1950’s Plymouth, pink dollar bills, cribbage tournaments, golf trips, and, eventually, the effect of disability payments on dad and the family.  Looking back, more than anything else, those payments were likely where the problems as we eventually knew them really started, and their ultimate effects were probably seen this week.  If only we knew then.

Before I left, Mike and I sat down for a game of cribbage.  We used a tournament board, cards and pegs from when Dad ran cribbage tournaments all over the Midwest (the last of which, incidentally, was held in the hotel I’m sitting in now).  It had been years since I’d played the official family sport, and quite a while for Mike as well, and we were rusty enough on the rules that Mike had to google “knobs” to see what qualified.  The irony was that our dad was the one who first wrote the rules of tournament play for the American Cribbage Congress, and here his two sons were struggling to figure out what exactly they were.

In the end, I won by a pretty big margin, almost double-skunking my brother.  I kind of wanted it to be a closer game, but unfortunately Mike got one of the most ridiculously bad series of deals I’ve ever seen in a card game.  Cribbage is a mixed game of skill and chance, but last night my win was almost all chance.  We had one of the cardboard bracket boards they used in the tournament days, and to be completely proper about it Mike filled in the results once our game was over.

We left the bracket board, playing board, cards and pegs at the funeral home today, along with a few other items.  When they cremate dad on Monday, they’ll place those things with him.

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I’m sure I’ll have more to write over the next few days and weeks.  My dad was a big man with a big life, and there’s so much to say about him and everything he did, but for now I just need to absorb the fact that his life is over.

He was only twice as old as me. It still seems that he went way too early.

More later.