Kind Thanks

to everyone on this list, and at Catholic Restorationists list and all elsewhere who have written me notes of condolence, played tunes on the pipes, and most importantly, prayed for and had Masses said for the repose of my mother's soul.

I will be going to Vancouver this evening and will stay about ten days sorting her things and arranging funeral and greeting long-lost relatives. I don't expect to be able to put much up here in the meantime but be assured that all the kindnesses and prayers sent out from y'all have been greatly appreciated.

My mother and I are the first Catholics in our family history since at least the 1830's. The parish priest who attended her while she was ill is a Franciscan of somewhat, umm, dubious religious opinions (if I recall, Hawaiian shirts being de rigeur); I imagine therefore that arranging the Mass, especially since mum died without a penny to her name, will be something of a trial. My greatest hope is only to have there be a measure of decorum: no Beatles songs, no clapping, no sharing, no hand-shake o' peace, no eulogy, and, God forbid, no 'intercommunion'.

Pray especially that I will retain my cool with the Franciscans and their attendant BoomerCatholics, and maintain at least a minimal level of charitablenes. (Keeping in mind that their revolution is over and that it failed and that the winners - us - are called to be merciful in our victory and that we're all going to be in front of the same Judge some day.)

I woke in the wee hours this morning to turn on the fan in my room and while I was struggling with it, trying to make sure it neither fell into the room nor plummeted into the garden, I glanced out the window and saw one of the local working ladies pacing her walk up and down in front of the streetcar stop opposite the house. I was struck suddenly with the uncertainty of things in life. How easy it is for any of us to end up far away from where we thought we were supposed to be, for life to fail our expectations and then be over.

Thank God that He sees our lives in an entirely different light than our limitations can grasp, since His opinion and not that of our friends or relatives or even ourselves, is what matters. My mother and I had not been close for nearly 20 years and I had wondered for some time what effect her death might have on me. What I find is surprising. I feel somehow deracinated, as though there had been an invisible thread, almost never pulled on either end, that connected her to me, and me to all the people who came before us. I find now that for the first time in my life, I want to make some kind of connection, re-attach the thread, to the people who are left: Uncle Mike and Auntie Gill and to those Doloughan relatives mum was in contact with before she died. Not necessarily to become matey, but just to be known. I hope that there will be some information on them in her letters and that Mike and Gill will come to Vancouver next week. I haven't seen them, and they haven't seen me, in 35 years.

I keep thinking what a terrible botch of things we all make of our intentions; whether things "work out" or not, it is true of nearly everyone to some degree that life almost never goes where we thought it would. But of course, we all end up in the same place anyway.

If I could impose on y'all a while longer, please keep me and my mum in your prayers.