it's been a while

I feel like I haven't posted in so long. This week felt like it stretched on and on, what with the funeral and everything involved with that. On Thursday, we went to Grandpa's house to gather some photo albums. We ended up with three big boxes of photo albums and random photos. We took them home and I sat on the floor Thursday night and looked at every single one.

Friday was the funeral. Luckily, the weather was nice if a bit cold. That morning, I shaved my legs, I wore a skirt, I wore pantyhose, I wore high heels. Grandpa would have been proud, because he usually only saw me in jeans. Grandpa was always dressed up for everything. I never saw him wearing casual clothes.

I really don't know what to say about the funeral. It was a nice service. There was laughter, there were tears (oh, LOTS of tears), and it was a nice goodbye. The whole family kind of lost it walking out of the church behind the casket and we all stood outside the church crying and laughing at ourselves crying. I really like how my family handles things like this. I don't think funerals shouldn't be all uptight and completely somber. After the service, we all followed the hearse to the cemetary. I hadn't been out there since 6th grade, when my great grandma died, so it was nice to see her grave as well. We all got to keep a yellow rose (Grandpa's favorite flower) from the arrangement on top of the casket.

Eventually we all went back to the church for the wake. My dad's cousin had just adopted two babies from Guatemala. They were absolutely adorable and really good, considering they were passed around from person to person all day. At one point, I was playing Bingo with two of my younger cousins (although, they're all younger so that doesn't really narrow it down). Out of nowhere, Sammy lunged across the table, hugged me and said, "I miss Grandpa," and I just thought, "Oh, rip my heart out, why don't you."

It was definitely strange being at church without Grandpa. He was one of the church's founding members. He'd been going there for 50 years. When we were eating, I found myself looking around the room and then I realized I was looking for Grandpa.

Yesterday, we had the whole family over to our house because my mom's office ordered a bunch of food for us from Mama DiSalvo's. I don't want to say I drank too much wine . . . but I did and let's just say I didn't really feel human today til about 4 in the afternoon today. I don't want to talk about it.