Aunt Easter

Aunt Easter, in the end, did not make it all the way to Easter this year. Named Easter Lily, because she was born on Easter Sunday, she was in many ways as unique as her name, and this year, more than ever, she indicated the wish to celebrate her birthday...why? Because she was born on Easter Sunday the last time it fell on March 23, and that was in 1913. From the time she realized that her birthday would finally fall on Easter Sunday, she seemed to set her mind to living until she was 95. Yesterday, at around noon, she quietly slipped away, 2 and 1/2 days short of her last earthly goal.

We were not going to be able to go, but extended family from all parts of the US had been making plans for a celebration this weekend. In recent weeks, however, it became evident that, even if Aunt Easter lived to see her 95th birthday, she would be confined to some sort of medical institution, as she had gone from hospital to therapy center to hospital to nursing home and finally a hospice. I'm not sure I have correctly listed the exact order or the description of the facilities, but you get the idea. Early in the week, my cousin Frances, whom Aunt Easter lived with, announced the family reunion was canceled. The end was obviously near, and Aunt Easter's two children who live in other parts of the country came earlier than originally planned, in order to be there. My mother and uncle, the last two survivors of that generation, decided not to go down to Houston early in the week, as Mom said she preferred to remember her sister as she had last seen her, the lively, alert Aunt Easter we always remember her as being. The funeral will be "back home" in Arkansas, close to where Mom has gone to visit my uncle, and where they will wait for the funeral, to be held sometime early next week, most likely.

Aunt Easter and the Squid

Aunt Easter came to Madeira twice with Mom, in 1981 or 82 (before Dad died) and in the late 80s after he died, when the two sisters came on their own. While Aunt Easter had traveled abroad previously, it was the first time for my parents (except Dad during WWII, which was not quite the same sort of tourism).

On one occasion during their first visit, we had lunch in one of the restaurants in Funchal, and I decided to order a plate of the day, which was squid. Dad was very much a meat-and-gravy-with-mashed-potatoes man, so he ordered accordingly. When my plate was brought to the table, he quipped, "It looks like garden hose." I offered to let him try a bite, which he did, whereupon he commented, "It even tastes like garden hose."

Mom tasted a bite of the squid, too, but Aunt Easter declined; she said she had already tasted it on a previous trip to Europe.

A photo that gives you an idea of what the wicker sledge ride is all about.

A day or so later, Mom and Aunt Easter decided they wanted to ride down the mountain in the wicker sledges, which were a sort of public transport a 100 years ago...at least downhill. The sledge is wide enough for two adults and two "drivers" run along behind, alternately greasing the runners with an tallow-soaked cloth, or braking by holding the sledge back with ropes attached to each front corner, which also is the main steering mechanism. The run is about a mile or so down the steep street from a church on the side of the mountain to the city of Funchal. The degree of thrill of the actual experience depends on the clients and the particular drivers on any one run, and reactions vary widely.

Once we were all together again at the bottom, at the end of the run, each one was sharing his/her impressions of the ride. It was Aunt Easter's comment that entered into our family's phrasebook from that day on.

"What about you, Aunt Easter? How was it?"

"Well, I've eaten that squid."

Because of Aunt Easter, squid became synonymous in our family with what many people commonly express as "been there, done that," and we've tasted many varieties of squid since then.

Of time and eternity

I have a fascination for clocks, especially the mechanical, wind-up kind with a pendulum. We bought a cuckoo clock when we were in Austria in 1991, but it needs cleaning and the poor little bird has been silent for a year or more. While I could never afford a real grandfather's clock, I was able to get a wall clock for my consular office. There's something about the ticking of the mechanism that appeals to me, and it chimes on the half hour and hour. It can be a bit of a nuisance, though, if I happen to be on the phone at the stroke of noon, when 12 "gongs" can seem like 11 too many.

The face of the clock says it has a 30- or 31-day movement. My experience is that I'd better wind it every 28 or 29 days, and if I forget, time stops...as far as that clock is concerned. But if I listen carefully, if the clock is using the very last of the energy wound into the spring, it sounds different, and at the very end it gets slower. . .
a n d . . . . s -l - o - w - e - r . . . . a - n - d . . .
q - - u - - i - - e - - t - - e - - r . . . .u - - - n - - - t - - -i - - - l . . . .i - - - t . . . .
stops.

As we read my cousin's daily reports on Aunt Easter's conditions, I saw in my mind a clock that was running down to a slow, peaceful stop. And that's exactly how Frances described her mother's last hours: "Her breathing became slower and slower until mid-day. She quietly died."

Like my clock that runs down just short of the 31 days advertised, Aunt Easter's earthly life ran down just short of her earthly goal. Okay, she missed the party that was being planned, but in exchange, what a party she went to instead! And that party is no week-end affair, but one that just goes on and on and on. No winding needed.

I can imagine her saying as she entered the heavenly gates and looked back at her earthly existence, "Well, I've eaten that squid."