Waves of sadness

I'm surprised by how sad I am about No-legs. It keeps washing over me in waves.

When Grandpa Myszkowski died, I cried for about 24 hours straight. I have felt choked up about him a number of times since, of course, but I haven't had to cry and cry about him since the day he died. With No-legs I keep accidentally crying about him in public, including at work, which is pretty uncomfortable for everyone involved. I try not to reveal that much humanity all at once at work.

Maybe the difference is that there wasn't a service for Grandpa Myszkowski, so maybe it didn't feel as real to me as this does. Honestly, No-legs' service seemed to be when my unraveling started in earnest.

I had a particularly hard time looking at the collage of photos and seeing photos of Grandpa standing up. He'd been sitting down so long I hardly remembered him being just a regular guy. There was a particular photo of him standing in his garden in his shirtless old-guy way that made me cry out loud. He was really into his garden. I regret not including that in his obit or in my eulogy. It's been so long since I saw him like that.

I was flooded with memories of him when he was just my regular grandpa. I included some of those memories in my eulogy, but they keep coming and I keep being sad.

I feel smooshy on my insides. And I know the smooshy part is going to pass. I'm almost afraid that the smooshy part will pass and I'll accidentally forget the good parts about No-legs (I'll have no problem remembering the bad parts, I'm sure).

Here's the obit I wrote for him. I was concerned that if I didn't step in it would be too much like the "into the pearly gates" "onto his heavenly reward" "angels called him home" bullshit that's in the papers today. The funeral home added a couple things, but I'm pleased they submitted it to the papers nearly as I sent it to them.

I tried my No-legs jokes on Saturday night. I was afraid I was going to cry right in the middle, but I didn't, and I got an incredible laugh and a loving response from the audience. More on this when I report on my first three days as comic in residence. In any case, I'm not sure when I'm going to be able to tell the jokes again or how they'll end up when they're done. I'll keep trying.