Coming Home

There is a picture of my father growing up, surrounded by his family.  It is Kennedy-esq both in era and aesthetic.  The oldest of seven children, he stands with his brothers and sisters behind their seated parents, the youngest sitting on his mother's lap.  Several of the boys wear plaid jackets; one of my aunts has pearls around her neck and a Jackie-O flip to her hair.  My grandmother is turning slightly to look at her brood, a broad smile on her face.  They are all sun-kissed, laughing.  I have been told it was their parents' surprise anniversary party.  For me, the beautiful moment captured in this one photo contains, and does not belie, the many other (hilarious) stories I have heard through the years of life with these seven siblings.  Brothers ambushing their sisters' dates from the front door bushes with toy bazooka guns.  Breakfast trips to the local diner in their Sunday best in lieu of Mass, with the hope that their mother would not be the wiser (knowing my Grandmother even only for the brief time that I did, I would bet the joke was on them).  A pet duck that sadly did not survive the amount of love and tight hugs around the neck it received.  Babysitters who simply left mid-shift, the pranks having pushed them to the breaking point.  But in all of these stories of "misbehavior" a running theme of collusion, love, and the support of deep bonds.

This photo was on display as my family gathered this week to say goodbye to my Uncle Jimmy, the second of the seven.  Jimmy was a pilot, both by training and calling.  A retired Colonel when he died, he began his flying career in the Air Force, and served in many missions from Vietnam through the Gulf War.  One of my most pivotal moments as a teenager involved visiting Jimmy at the Air Force base where he served as Commander.  In addition to having the chance to explore the transport plane that he flew (massive, cavernous, and overwhelming even on the ground), we were on hand to witness the first plane of soldiers returning from the Gulf, the war having only recently ended.  As a relatively sheltered high school student attending a progressive urban school, I knew of the war only from the news and social studies class.  If I had any opinions on the conflict they were ivory tower at best.  But as I watched these families waiting for the plane carrying their loved ones to arrive, the kids holding signs antsy with anticipation, I had the honor of standing with my Uncle in his world, privy to his reality.  The wait was excruciating.  My heart began to beat faster.  I began to have irrational worries: What if the plane hadn't been able to leave? What if it had encountered mechanical problems on the way?  How could these families bear the disappointment with a promised reunion within their reach?

And then the wait was over.  They were here.  I saw the soldiers walk across the tarmac towards the hanger where we waited, potato chips and Coke set out for the celebration.  At first only small, beige figures in the distance, but then slowly faces began to emerge and recognition by the waiting families began to go off like kernels of corn popping, the momentum building to a fever pitch.  The families moved up....as close as allowed to the air field....closing the gap between them until - finally - they met.  I remember weeping openly as I watched them embrace. Wives hugging husbands, children hugging parents.  And I had the smallest of windows into their sacrifice, one that is always with me no matter my geopolitical views.

Being a good Irish Catholic family, there is nothing somber about our wakes.  They are celebrations of life, in the best sense.  We all share a similar laugh - loud, melodic, sustained - and I heard it echoing in harmony among the many relatives who gathered to pay their respects. The stories flowed...the oral history that has been a part of my life as long as I can remember, as well as new ones about Jimmy I had not previously known (not to mention new stories we managed to create just during our time together this week).  I observed the love being shared in the room, and looked at my uncle lying in repose in the middle of it all.  I smiled thinking of how much he would have enjoyed this gathering; of the stories and jokes he would have told; of his laugh....loud, melodic, sustained.  And in my mind, Brett Dennan's "Dancing at a Funeral" played: "Now's not the time, to be so sad and mournful, we are going to the funeral, and we'll be dancing the night away.  So so so don't be so shy, we are living and we're dying; we are laughing and we're crying, every single day."

Selfishly I cherished an opportunity to be with my extended family, even under sad circumstances.  These are the relatives (well, half of the relatives) that I grew up celebrating holidays and special occasions with.  They are the ones who helped form my sense of family and tradition; things that I now try to create for my own family.  Geography and the pace of life keeps me from being with them regularly, but the deep connection I feel to them (and their connection to who I am, and where I came from) is as strong as ever.  It was not lost on me, particularly as we entered the Church for the funeral Mass and found it still beautifully decorated in twinkling lights for Christmas, that although this is an awful time of year to lose a loved one, our coming together around the holidays nonetheless evokes a certain comfort ingrained by years of practice and familiarity.

At the funeral the priests gave a meaningful and personal tribute to Jimmy, focusing on his love of flying, his service to our country, his role in transporting people to their destinations both in the Air Force and later as a commercial pilot.  They focused on passages from the Bible that celebrate our safe journey home; home to God, home to be united with our loved ones who have gone before us. They celebrated the communion of Saints; the belief that we are all one, all connected in this life.  A sentiment echoed in the ee cummings poem that my Aunt reproduced in the program.  It begins poignantly: "I carry your heart with me (I carry it in my heart)".  A celebration not only of their love story, but the love and connection we all share.

Unlike my uncle I do not enjoy flying.  To me, an airplane is a large lead balloon, waiting to drop from the sky.  Although I know it is irrational and factually inaccurate, when I picture the cockpit of a commercial flight, in my mind the pilots have both hands on the steering wheel, holding on with all their might, keeping us afloat by sheer will and brute strength, yelling to each other every time a bump hits: "Hold on!  Hold on!"  I imagine that if they broke their concentration for even a minute, it would be with tragic consequences.  As I prepared to fly home following the funeral, I began my normal pre-take-off rituals: pop my "happy pill"; put on my head phones and turn them up as loud as my ears can stand to drown out the mechanical noises; pull up my hoodie over my head to block the window from my vision.  I settled back into my seat trying to distract myself from the moment when the acceleration would indicate our impending lift and imagined the pilots doing all the mandatory routine checks that I have studied in an effort to educate and assure myself that it is not just by chance that the plane will function.  But this time, in my mind, it was Jimmy at the controls.  Calm.  Confident.  Handsome in his uniform.  A smile on his face.  Happy and excited to be taking-off; exhilarated at the prospect of flight.  And I was enveloped in peace, knowing that he would carry me safely home.