“Bye, With Love”
This was the week that we said “Goodbye” to Clorinda. “Bye, with Love” is how she finished every phone call. I joined Diana in Pacifica, CA in time to get dressed for the vigil service on Wednesday evening. I hadn’t attended a vigil before and wasn’t really sure what to expect. All of the siblings spoke, including a very nice tribute from Diana. Several others spoke, including an entertaining and clever speech from Jeff. However, the highlight for me was Luciano, age 10, with a very touching tribute. He had nothing prepared and saw his Mom go up to speak and decided he should say something too. What a great job he did.
Will and Christine made it to the vigil and left this lovely memory card. Clorinda would laugh every time the silly llama did its Christmas dance with its neck extending up and down.
I need to rewind to Tuesday now and talk about a big win for the Bayou Boyz. It seemed “trivial” to mention this before talking about the services for Clorinda. Maybe that gives you a hint about the topic? Yes – we won first place, and a $50 Dat Dog gift card, in the weekly trivia challenge. We only missed one of 37 questions. Now back to more important reporting.
The funeral service took place on Thursday morning and was very well attended. I wasn’t sure of the protocol for a Catholic service – and was offered no help as we processed in given order into the church and stopped to do something at the urn. I couldn’t see what anyone was doing and I was last in line, so just nodded at the urn and sat down. A little help in advance please guys?
Alicia did a great job of “Ave Maria” on her flute – most impressive given she hasn’t played in years (my guess) and had just a short time to prepare.
Here’s a wee treat for you – Clorinda performing “Ave Maria” at Adamo’s wedding:
We held a reception in the multi-purpose hall at the church. Diana’s guess of 150 attendees seemed spot on. She had arranged some excellent caterers and I think the event came off very well. We were “treated” to a performance from the five brothers:
Here’s Diana telling Marco what a wonderful job he did with the eulogy – it truly was amazing. Marco is a great public speaker but he really outdid himself with this review of his Mom’s life and what was important to her.
After the reception, a smaller group joined us back at Clorinda’s house for leftovers and other offerings. Felly was one of the caregivers for the last couple of months. You can tell how much she is loved by the kids, Caroline and everyone who came in contact with her:
We gathered around the mandala that Amy had made with flowers from the hill.
On Friday, we commuted to the cemetery in Santa Clara. Oh, I should share one tiny example of the “detailed” approach Marco took to these events – as we were pulling away, he had a friend stop us to give instructions on printing out a different picture of his mom to be displayed at the grave site. “No, sorry, we’re out of time. He’ll have to choose from the four we already have with us.”
We arrived at the gravesite, and the groundskeeper explained how the burial would work – Clorinda’s urn going in a container above the slab covering Sebastian. All seemed straight forward, until he asked for the “Authorization for Burial certificate.” “The what certificate?, we had no idea that was needed.” Oopsy! ” What do we do if we can’t get one?” “You can have the service, but nothing can be put in the ground.” This was not pleasing to anyone. Time to “solve the problem.”
Diana called the funeral home and couldn’t get anyone to answer. I asked, “Who can we call to go by and roust them up to get a copy?” Of course, Andy. Then it occured to me to have Andy go down to Clorinda’s house and see if he could find it among the funeral papers in a folder on the printer. He found it in a few minutes, I texted it to the cemetery director and we were good to fully proceed. Whew!
Saturday was a day to chill and try to relax. We were sorry that we missed Jack’s graduation at the Superdome in New Orleans. He graduated from Loyola University and starts a short internship with my company in a few weeks. He’s on the left.
Sunday was a travel day back home for me, with Diana staying another few days to finish things up.
That was a pretty exhausting week in several ways!