Packing With Obituaries

Tonight, I poured myself into several boxes of quality packing, as I am running out of time and this is the first occasion in almost three years that I can't pull off a "ghetto move" where I just throw massive amounts of crap on the seats of my car and drive fifteen miles per hour around ten corners to the next house. No, this 800 mile adventure requires a little more cushioning and preparation.

I must admit, it has been an enjoyable experience crumpling and tearing the many pages I've saved daily of the overly right leaning Salt Lake Tribune to wrap up my breakables...but I realize that I have a problem using the obituaries.

I can compare defacing the memories of these recently departed humans to the time my cat Louie performed a cold blooded killing on an adorable little sparrow. It was able to cling onto life for a few minutes after I ran to its rescue, but sadly died. After yelling at Louie and grounding him to the house, I scooped up the dead bird and threw him in the garbage can. A pang of guilt hit me thirty seconds later...how could I just toss a lost life into a vat of filth? I retrieved him out of the garbage can, grabbed a shovel, and treated him to a proper burial in the backyard.

Now, some people may get pissed just at the idea of me comparing dead birds to those souls who have moved on to bigger and better things, but I am one of those people who will trap a bee or spider in a cup and then release it to newfound safety and freedom outside...life is life, and I don't want to be the centipede who gets her legs torn off by a five year old kid in my next life, you know what I mean?

So the pictures of dead people in the obits don't represent everything... that's why they have funerals with caskets and urns. I remember when my best friend Greg died, we took his box of ashes out to brunch and sat a pack of Camels on him, ordered him a cup of coffee, talked to him, and even kissed him goodbye as we left...I guess losing someone you love makes you a little crazy for a while, but my God, I know I still blow him kisses toward the heavens now and then. Good thing is Greg's scattered over a beautiful mountain range in Anchorage, Alaska now instead of still kicking it on a table at Carrows (though I hope he's still enjoying his nicotine and caffeine because nothing can hurt him now).

Besides the point, every time a page of memorials land in my hands, I feel a twinge of disrespect...so I take a few minutes to look them over and I offer some silent condolences. If they look down and see the pretty pieces of pottery and vases their memorials are being wrapped around, I bet they won't mind anyway.