This story is one of EPIC preportion that my mother would have absolutely loved to tell.  Problem is, its all about her ashes.

My mother died 13 years before my father did.  When she died, they had been married for 46 years.  They would still hold hands across the aisle of their burgundy color Ford conversion van with the velvet curtains.  It was sweet.

When my mother died, it was rather sudden.  We found out she had Leukemia in January by a fluke – some random “lump” behind her knee raised up during a wedding.  It bothered her so much my dad took her to the emergency room.  By the time the doctors were done checking her out, the lump was gone, but the Leukemia diagnosis was in its place.  She died 2 months later.

My mother was cremated at a Kelly and Spalding funeral home down the street from the house where we grew up.  I have great memories of all the neighborhood kids playing football on the beautiful lawns of the funeral home fall and spring evenings.

After my mothers death my dad lived in their “retirement house” in Waterford Wisconsin for about a year, but eventually sold that house and moved in with my middle brother Neal and his family.  Mom and Dad had lived with them before, so Dad just kind of settled into the old part of the house and puttered around trying his best to help out Robin with chores and fix-it projects.  Eventually, he moved into his own apartment literally a stones throw away from Robin and Neal and after a couple of years, moved south west to Batavia and next door to the oldest brother, Todd.

It was then that I got the first call.  “Willard?”, Neal said.  (My brothers call me Willard).  “Do you know where Mom is?”.  Odd question…..I answer, “No.  I figured Dad took her up to the lake in Minnesota and scattered her ashes there”.  “No”, Neal says.  “I was cleaning out the attic and I found this box.  It was labled Kelly and Spalding Funeral Home.”  So, my mother was in Neal’s attic for a few years, hmmmm……

Neal returned the ashes to my dad and talked to him about how he should do something with them.  I can just picture my dad looking down at his feet, shuffling like a 5 year old getting scolded for bad behavior.  The subject was dropped.  That is until………

A few years later.  Dad had gotten to a point it was better if he moved into a senior apartment complex so he could eat more than cherry pie for breakfast, lunch and dinner and Neal came down to help move him.  At the end of that weekend, I get another call.  “Willard?”, Neal says.  “Do you know where Mom is?”  I repeat, “I would have thought that BY NOW he would have done something with her”.  “No”, says Neal.  “I was doing one last sweep in the basement and found the box on a shelf”.  So…..Mom moved from the attic to the basement.  Interesting.  Neal returned the box to my Dad.

After a time at the apartments, Dad met up with a lady-friend.  Dutchie made him smile and he had a hand to hold again.  They decided to combine incomes and share an apartment.   About a year later, Dad’s heart finally gave out.

I live about 900 miles away and my family had to travel back to for the funeral.  Of course, it was held at Kelly and Spalding funeral home, yes, the same name as the label on the box my dad carried around with him 13 years.

The day of the visitation, I hade just arrived in town and get a call from Robin.  She tells me the story of she and Neal talking about getting dads stuff out of Dutchie’s apartment when they both realize – WHERE’S MOM???  They head over to see Dutchie with a story they are looking for something Dad wanted with him.   After searching drawers and closets, they finally make it out to the shared storage space,  and there they find what they are looking for.  The box.  Not knowing what to do, Robin decides to wrap the box like a gift and has the funeral home place it in the crook of my dad’s left arm.  They were worried the funeral home wouldn’t think kindly of having my mom in the casket with my dad.  I thought it was genius.

After 13 years, they were finally together again.  I asked my dad’s sister Dot later, why didn’t he ever do anything with Mom’s ashes?  She said he had told her years before that he wanted to be buried with her in his arms.  I guess he got exactly what he wanted. (though it would have been nice if he had told someone!)

An interesting twist occurred with my Dad, my Mom and the burial.  As it turns out, my dad died on the same day as his beloved older sister Margaret whom he and my mom had gone fishing with in Minnesota every year since before I was born.  Given my dad hadn’t made any plans, my brother was able to secure a burial plot right next to Margaret where they both grew up in East Peoria, Il.

I cant but help hearing that preachers voice in my head saying “Today we lay to rest Margaret Keys, her brother Gene Geitner and his wife Jean Geitner”……I bet he wondered how that happened!