The throaty sound of her voice makes me want to cry. McBride’s version of Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas demands I pay attention.

“Through the years we’ll all be together, if the fates allow…”

Well, they didn’t allow.

*  *  *

I’m not above circling the block to re-evaluate my parking options, especially with three kids who traveled with me longer than daylight and a cargo hitch bolted to the back of my car.
We’ll just walk a little farther. It will build character in them, and maybe some chest hair with these stupid temperatures.

“Okie dokie, hats on everybody.”
I give my son a look of challenge when he says, “I don’t need it. I’m not cold.”
“Well you will be out there,” I urge with a lazy wave to the Midwest tundra.
“I promise. I won’t.” Fine, Stubborn Mule, get hypothermia for all I care. You’re so like…your mother.

It hits us like a collision, that wet cold that seeps into every orifice of our being. We brace our shoulders and tread a little faster to the building, any building that will shield us from the ridiculousness of it all. But which door? There are two, both bright red and on the same wall, yet the mistake could cost me embarrassment beyond tolerance. Oh, the anxiety.

So I check everyone’s britches are free of their rear, take a breath, and choose the one with a promise to get us out of the arctic soonest. We open to stairs, cases of them, and another closed door. For pity’s sake, the anxiety, again.

A side door. Which means not a stage door so basically, perfect.

We made it, I think through an exhale, and notice someone from my family who looks quite like my uncle 30 years ago. Ah, my cousin…I think. I hope, because I just called him by my cousin’s name.
He seems too young to have so much beard. “How are you?” I ask, and immediately question my own question. The answer, I know, is in the casket up front. His taut mouth and heavy eyes tell the same story: This day is not wanted. It’s just so difficult.

Glancing around I catch eyes with another cousin who seems more like an aunt because of the decades between our birthdays. But in the entirety of the moment that span closes under the helm of family. That’s all we are in this sanctuary, family, who’s come together to remember and say goodbye.

With a pointing finger I explain to my kids where we’re heading, the line of people at the front.

“Why is that man laying down like that?”
“Good question. I’ll tell you when we sit down.” It’s enough to quiet her and give me time to ponder the anomaly. In church, dressed up, but there’s someone at the center of the room who looks like they’re taking a nap. We spend countless minutes looking at them as they don’t move. Then there’s crying and tissues and wiping and nodding. Yes, this would be confusing to a preschooler.

She’s sitting, my aunt, as she looks up at me with a kind of lost joy and I take her hands. “I know you’re mine,” she says. “But who are ya?”
“Cheryl’s daughter,” I say without offense. How can I feel anything but compassion in the face of a woman who’s lost the love of her life? Which is no exaggeration. When her husband was five years old he told his father he was going to marry my aunt.
It’s in my eyes, I realize, that she knows me. They are my mom’s. And they are hers, mirroring mine.
“Oh, you have such a good mommy. Thank you so much for coming.”
There’s nothing left but an embrace. It conveys all we feel.

The line gets less easy as the hugging doubles, triples. Cousins, spouses, some I haven’t seen since we scraped by puberty. “I’m coming for you next,” I tell one of them.

When we finally find our seats and I’m overwhelmed by the magnitude of the organ pipes taking me back to my childhood with their chords of How Great Thou Art, I lean to my mom. “I am much too happy for this occasion.”

“Let your heart be light.
From now on your troubles will be out of sight.”

We are not so naïve to understand our troubles aren’t distanced. In fact, for certain members of my family this reality will be an unwelcome constant through the holiday season. But maybe our hearts will be a little lighter because we walk through it together.