Funeral Observations Part Two
Saturday, August 23rd, we buried my father in law. He was 81 years old at the time of his death. In my last blog I started to discuss what I experienced during the preparations for his funeral.
The nightly prayers continued right up until the night before he was buried, as did the gambling and the partying. The latter I could understand quite readily, as people wanted to celebrate his life and they were doing so.
But I just couldn’t get past the whole not being able to shave or trim my finger-nails during this time.
So when Saturday arrived we got ready for dad to take his final ride. It broke my heart when they closed the casket and loaded him into the hearse. One of his daughters and his wife fainted when this happened.
I felt it was really strange that there were tons of photos taken of the various family members, starting with dad’s wife, then the children, then the in-laws, and of course the grandkids. I am serious, it was awkward as hell, especially when the photographer asked us to smile. I think pulling teeth from chickens would have been easier.
We walked for about a kilometer, with my son in the lead, holding a picture of dad. He had this honor because my son was the first born of all his grandkids. It really was quite the honor if you ask me.
We drove the rest of the way to the church in San Miguel and my father-in-law attended his final mass. It lasted an hour and again there were pictures taken with his casket. They opened it once again for a brief period of viewing.
After that we loaded him into the hearse and as we did before, we walked about a kilometer before loading up and driving to his final resting place, a cemetery called ‘The Garden of Ascension’.
When we arrived his casket was unloaded again and set up. Two of his remaining siblings had a few words to say about him, but of course I couldn’t understand it because it was in Tagalog. Then my wife and two of his Grandkids went up to speak about him and his life. At least my wife said her eulogy in English so I could understand it.
Heart-wrenching, believe me.
Then we took his body to the grave. A final few words were spoken and we dropped flowers and flower petals onto the casket as it was lowered into the tomb. Yes, a cement tomb had been laid down beforehand. For some reason before the tomb was sealed, one of the workers placed match-sticks in each corner. Again two people ended up fainting and to see my family grieve like they were (even the two I have a serious dislike for), tore at my heart.
But it was over. They buried him and we returned home.
There were hundreds of people there, waiting for the feast. We had to purchase and butcher two pigs and a cow. By the time the feast was over, there was very little food left. Once everyone was cleared out we had a private wake for dad. Lots of serious drinking and dancing. I am not a drinker, I never have been and never will be… but I won’t deny the fact that I got so wasted that I couldn’t even stand.
Something I never plan on doing again.
Sunday the 24th was quiet and spent cleaning up the massive mess that was left behind. And believe me, there was a mess. No one showed up for partying or gambling.
Something very strange happened on Sunday however, two things that I can’t explain. During the day there were hundreds of massive dragonflies hovering over the house. Typically that means they have found a good place to lay their eggs, but there were no good water sources directly around the house. My family took it as a good sign.
But after we went to bed, around 1 AM my wife woke me up, scaring the hell out of me. She was speaking in Tagalog and continued to do so until I shook her and told her to speak English. She said that she couldn’t breathe and didn’t feel well. I asked her if she needed anything and she didn’t answer, only lay back down and returned to sleep.
Then at around 3 AM she woke again, scaring me again, and complaining about the same thing, but this time she was speaking English. She asked me to turn on the light and I complied and she went out into the living room to speak to her brother. My son got up at the same time but I decided to go back to sleep.
Turns out that I missed something. The bedroom that dad used filled with a chilling fog. No-where else, not outside, no other location in the house.
I would have called bullshit on this except that my son happened to wake up and witnessed it with my wife and two of her siblings.
If this happens again tonight, I want to be woken so that I can take pictures of this supernatural phenomena. There is probably a logical explanation for it but I’ll be damned if I can think of what it is.
Next week I’ll go into detail when it comes to the cultural differences that I witness here on a daily basis. But for now I will go back to my usual blog.
The past week saw me complete the first issue of ‘Alternate Character Advancement’. I will probably continue working on it as the first issue was quite large and there is material that will have to be trimmed and used for a second issue.
At this time I have completed two more issues for a new mini-series that will be added to the Wisdom from the Wastelands. This is called ‘Harvesting’ and it is all about harvesting the natural treasures from creatures, such as toxins, hides, and so forth. I presented some bare-bones basic rules covering mutations in the first issue and then began to write up items that can be harvested from the various monsters that were presented in the Mutant Future core book. I’m currently about halfway finished the third issue and this series could go as many as five issues in total.
Once they are published I will be sure to make sure that they are split up and that there is always something else in between each issue.
I am still thinking of working on the powered armor book, so we shall see. As for working on my short stories, maybe now that the funeral is over and we have some semblance of peace and quiet here in the house I will be able to do some fiction writing.
Hey, the upside is that we did manage to catch Lucy. Interesting concept to be sure, but without any spoilers, I found the last quarter just plain weird and kind of hard to follow.
I also managed to watch a fairly dull but well shot movie called ‘Last Days on Mars’. It was essentially a zombie movie on mars, but without hundreds of ravening zombies out to eat everything in sight. I found it to be boring. Will I do a conversion? I’m not sure, I will see.
Last week I started to post the weapons from Aliens: Colonial Marines. I have continued to post one a day for the past week and they can all be found on the D-Infinity site. And thanks to one of my readers and fellow bloggers, Eric Fabiaschi, I have ended up posting the aliens that I converted and originally posted on the original D-Infinity page in the old forums. Once I have posted the remaining two, I will begin to convert and post the alien variants that were presented in the game.
Hell I might even go as far as doing some conversions from the comic of the same name.
Anyhow, that’s pretty much it for now.
I finally managed to get 100 likes for my personal author page! Here’s hoping that it will continue to grow. Please do me a favor and like my page, if you would be so kind. It takes but a few seconds to do so.
And I still have only a single follower on twitter. If you could, please follow me and I will begin to use this social media site and post there.
Until next week, peace.
