06-20-2020, 04:09 AM
Travel is broadening! The flights went fine. It's nice to be guaranteed that the middle seat in a row will be empty. The flights were as full as they could be, but my rows on both legs of the journey were empty. The whole social distancing thing fell apart when it was time to deplane and everyone got up at once and clogged the aisles.
It also failed when we had to get on the bus to the car rental building. That bus was packed.
On the record, I hate renting cars. There always seems to be some scam to get me to spend more money whether it's insurance or satellite radio or now the EZ Pass for tolls. I read online that Massachusetts has a scanner for license plates. You just had to go online and pay the tolls. At the checkout counter, I'm informed that's fiction. That I need to get the EZ Pass in order to pay the tolls. That my supposedly $2 toll would be $12. I took the roads without tolls to my Aunt Eileen's house.
I got in around 9:30 edt. I get the honor of sleeping the room where my Aunt passed away. I stayed in this room when I was last in Melrose and my Uncle had just passed away in this room.
It's very strange to be in the house. It's full of memories of both of them without actually having both of them in it. It was partly bad without my Uncle, full bad without my Aunt
I spent a lot of time talking to my cousin Chris about my Aunt and his brothers and sisters. There are five kids total; Jay, Linda, Chris, and David. There is a lot more tension between the siblings than I remember. Chris is the one that had eight daughters and the messy divorce. Like all good Lynches, the kids are fond of telling the others what to do. Chris's siblings are fond of telling him what to do with his kids. For instance none of them were happy that Chris's daughter was bringing her four year old to the wake. They figured it would be traumatizing. I figured what do you remember when you were four? But there are a lot of these little things popping around.
I spent a lot of Friday hanging around the house waiting for the wake at 4. I had breakfast from Dunkin Donuts and lunch from Kelly's which is fabulous roast beef sandwich shop. Arby's could learn a lot of lessons from Kelly's. Kelly's was also Aunt Eileen's goto spot. She loved their Lobster rolls. It felt odd going there and not getting her one.
There were a lot of pandemic rules in place at the wake. Only a few people could be in the hall at a time. They were washing down the pens used to sign the remembrance book. People had a lot of awkward moments of whether to hug or not to hug. Everyone was in masks. The number one topic of conversation after Aunt Eileen was about masks.
I got to see all my cousins and their children. And the children brought their boyfriends and girlfriends so there was quite the big crowd before the mourners even started showing up. My youngest cousin, Janet arrived late which is another topic of conversation with the rest family.
Most of the kids were sent home to make space in the mourning room for visitors. It was pretty packed for the entire run of 4 to 7. My cousins from my mother's side of the family also showed up. It was nice they stopped by and I got to meet their new dog Lillie. DM should have come to New England where he could have gotten a sled dog rescue.
Afterwards I could have gone to Chris's place to hang out with him and his daughters or I could go back to Aunt Eileens to spend some time with Jay, Linda and their spouses. I opted for Aunt Eileen's because I needed to get out of the suit. We had a lovely dinner of pizza from Aunt Eileen's favorite pizza place.
We chatted. I learned about more bones of contention among the siblings and other family stories. I spent time with the spouses while Jay and Linda did mysterious things upstairs. Linda's husband was kind enough to say he knew I would be there at the funeral when it was announced.
Finally, they all left and I was left all alone in Aunt Eileen's house. Chris was still over at his apartment with his girls when I finally went to sleep. So, yes, it was just me and the ghosts and the memories for a good two hours.
It also failed when we had to get on the bus to the car rental building. That bus was packed.
On the record, I hate renting cars. There always seems to be some scam to get me to spend more money whether it's insurance or satellite radio or now the EZ Pass for tolls. I read online that Massachusetts has a scanner for license plates. You just had to go online and pay the tolls. At the checkout counter, I'm informed that's fiction. That I need to get the EZ Pass in order to pay the tolls. That my supposedly $2 toll would be $12. I took the roads without tolls to my Aunt Eileen's house.
I got in around 9:30 edt. I get the honor of sleeping the room where my Aunt passed away. I stayed in this room when I was last in Melrose and my Uncle had just passed away in this room.
It's very strange to be in the house. It's full of memories of both of them without actually having both of them in it. It was partly bad without my Uncle, full bad without my Aunt
I spent a lot of time talking to my cousin Chris about my Aunt and his brothers and sisters. There are five kids total; Jay, Linda, Chris, and David. There is a lot more tension between the siblings than I remember. Chris is the one that had eight daughters and the messy divorce. Like all good Lynches, the kids are fond of telling the others what to do. Chris's siblings are fond of telling him what to do with his kids. For instance none of them were happy that Chris's daughter was bringing her four year old to the wake. They figured it would be traumatizing. I figured what do you remember when you were four? But there are a lot of these little things popping around.
I spent a lot of Friday hanging around the house waiting for the wake at 4. I had breakfast from Dunkin Donuts and lunch from Kelly's which is fabulous roast beef sandwich shop. Arby's could learn a lot of lessons from Kelly's. Kelly's was also Aunt Eileen's goto spot. She loved their Lobster rolls. It felt odd going there and not getting her one.
There were a lot of pandemic rules in place at the wake. Only a few people could be in the hall at a time. They were washing down the pens used to sign the remembrance book. People had a lot of awkward moments of whether to hug or not to hug. Everyone was in masks. The number one topic of conversation after Aunt Eileen was about masks.
I got to see all my cousins and their children. And the children brought their boyfriends and girlfriends so there was quite the big crowd before the mourners even started showing up. My youngest cousin, Janet arrived late which is another topic of conversation with the rest family.
Most of the kids were sent home to make space in the mourning room for visitors. It was pretty packed for the entire run of 4 to 7. My cousins from my mother's side of the family also showed up. It was nice they stopped by and I got to meet their new dog Lillie. DM should have come to New England where he could have gotten a sled dog rescue.
Afterwards I could have gone to Chris's place to hang out with him and his daughters or I could go back to Aunt Eileens to spend some time with Jay, Linda and their spouses. I opted for Aunt Eileen's because I needed to get out of the suit. We had a lovely dinner of pizza from Aunt Eileen's favorite pizza place.
We chatted. I learned about more bones of contention among the siblings and other family stories. I spent time with the spouses while Jay and Linda did mysterious things upstairs. Linda's husband was kind enough to say he knew I would be there at the funeral when it was announced.
Finally, they all left and I was left all alone in Aunt Eileen's house. Chris was still over at his apartment with his girls when I finally went to sleep. So, yes, it was just me and the ghosts and the memories for a good two hours.
As a matter of fact, my anger does keep me warm