Laughing At Funerals

Okay:

So, my grandmother has the Alzheimer's.

Tragic but humorous.

My mother is originally from a small town in South Carolina. Every summer when I was a kid we would ride down there and spend a week or so with our grandparents.

My grandfather was the quintessential country boy. He rode a Harley, went fishing every weekend, made his own wine, kept a pistol underneath the sofa cushion. When his dog got old and sick, he took him out back and shot him. Then he buried him next to his fig tree. He's a card carrying member of the NRA and he always keeps his word.

A few years ago he called my mother and asked her, "Doris, what's all this dubya dubya dot dot business?"

My grandmother spent most of her time in the kitchen. Everything she cooks is delicious, but she is most famous for her sweet potato pie. She's a small woman, gentle, and soft-spoken.

But now she has the Alzheimer's. No more cobbler.

My mother moved her up here from South Carolina a few years ago. Put her in a nice home.

Occasionally, I have to go pick her up and drop off prescriptions and whatnot. She's always nice but she has absolutely no idea who I am. Once, after I told her I don't eat pork, she trapped me in an hour-long cyclical conversation about the many culinary uses of the pig.

"You can make ham, bacon, fried fatback, pig ears, pig feet, hog malls...So you don't eat no pork, huh?...That's too bad....You Jewish?....No?....Well, you know you can make ham, bacon, fried fatback, pig ears, pig feet, hog malls...So you don't eat no pork, huh?...That's too bad...You Jewish?...No?....Well..."

Funny but a little frightening.

There are other recurring questions.

"Who's daughter is that?"

"How old are you?"

and of course, "What time is it?"

Unfortunately, as I discovered over the holidays, Alzheimer's gets less funny as it progresses. To my family's credit though, we still find a way to squeeze some hearty laughs out of what should be a heart-breaking experience.

For example, she rarely makes sense when she speaks now. There are no more humorous questions or cyclical conversations. Just meaningless jabber. Whatever it is that she's saying, she seems to think it's rather important. I think she leaves out important words. Like a puzzle.

"You know...down in Rock Hill...James...went fishing...big ole catfish...television...nasty white woman...everybody went home hungry."

Then there was the disturbing pacing. She paced back and forth across the living room floor all night. Wringing her hands.

Then, of course, there was the bag.

The bag. The bag. The bag.

My mother was making Christmas dinner and my grandmother had somehow gotten hold of a one gallon freezer bag. She began placing items into the bag.

A handful of diced onions.

A cork.

A damp towel.

A grocery list.

Some candy.

She carried this bag around with her while she paced about in the living room, mumbling to herself and wringing her hands.

Grandma, grandma, grandma.

Nanna.

It is sad. Yes. Also, hilarious.

They say tragedy plus time equals comedy. But I believe it is the truly enlightened who are able to find comedy in the moment, right smack dab in the middle of an absolute tragedy. My family has turned this into an art. We laugh at everything. Nothing is taboo. We laugh at funerals. Especially at funerals. It just never occurs to us that just because something is sad does not mean that it isn't funny.

Now my mother is missing a spatula, as she discovered the other day. Our money says somebody stole her spatula and took it back with her to her nursing home. Which is funny, right? I mean, come on.

That spatula could be interpreted as a metaphor. Somewhere in her brain she remembers that she used to be a dynamite cook. Some part of her wanted to take it is a keepsake. Which is cool, but it really held up breakfast.

Thanks for reading.

REDSKINS TO THE BOWL!

Confession: I once got caught having sex on a log in a public park at 4 o'clock in the afternoon by an eighty-year-old white man walking his dog. "This is a public park or Christ's sake!" he said.