Today was an earlier start and I got up at 6:30 to make sure I had enough time to shower and get ready. We had to be at the funeral home by 9:30, and I knew my sisters would probably take a while getting ready in the bathroom. I ate a bowl of honey bunches of oats with a cup of coffee once again. Tomorrow it would be back to my routine corn flakes and bowl of coffee.
Around 8:30, we hit the road and made it to Staten Island in decent time. We were first going to the funeral home to say our final goodbyes before closing the casket. We waited for a while in the room before they made the preparations to close the casket. One by one everyone said their final goodbyes. I paid my respects one final time to my grandma and touched her hand. It was bit eerie to feel how cold she was.
The mood was definitely a bit more emotional now that the casket was being closed. When you’re constantly coming back for wakes, it doesn’t really really feel like you’re saying goodbye yet to the deceased person. When the casket is closed, it all suddenly becomes much more real.
With the casket closed, it was time to head to the funeral. The church was conveniently located right across the street. My whole extended family headed over as a group with the casket. My cousin Steven and I were tasked with wheeling my grandpa over.
Pretty much everyone was already in the church was in there waiting for us. I wheeled my grandpa up to the entrance, then Steven and I went to take our place as pall bearers. The casket was on a dolly, so fortunately we didn’t really have to do much actual lifting. We brought the casket to the front of the church and took our places in the pews.
The mass started and occasionally members in my family would go up to do readings. This was definitely an emotional time, as my cousin was in tears while reading her passage. The rest of the mass went on as usual. The Priest gave a really nice speech and talked about meeting my grandparents for the first time. Some of my relatives go to this church, so the priest had eaten dinner with my grandparents before.
At the end of the mass, my mom gave the eulogy. I thought it was a very nice and moving speech and was proud of my mom. I was feeling pretty in check most of the services, but I definitely got a bit misty-eyed during the eulogy. Still, we were celebrating my Grandma’s long life and our sadness is just proof of how much everyone loved her.
Once the mass ended, we all headed outside to head the cemetery. In typical fashion, my cousin Steven and I helped our Grandpa into the limo. I got in the car with my sisters and joined the long funeral procession.
The cemetery was pretty close to the funeral home, but the procession drove by my grandmother’s home first. My sisters and I didn’t know this, and were a bit confused at first why we drove past the cemetery. We put two and two together and everything worked out. It definitely felt a bit odd to break some traffic laws while in the funeral procession. We must have went through at least three red lights.
We eventually made it to the cemetery and all parked our cars. For some reason, my grandparents were afraid of being buried in the ground. Because of this, my grandma was being put in a mausoleum. The workers from the funeral home gave everyone a flower as we headed over to the mausoleum. The priest said one last prayer and we made our final goodbyes. Everyone placed their flowers on top of the casket.
Here is a picture of the Casket and Mausoleum my cousin Vincent took. I don’t know if it is taboo to take pictures of this, but I thought it looked pretty.
With my grandma finally at peace, we left the cemetery and headed to a restaurant for a big lunch. It was at a place called La Strada, which unsurprisingly was an Italian restaurant.
It had been a long morning and I was starving. I sat at a table with my cousins aka the ten grandchildren (minus Andrew plus one fiance and one spouse). The lunch consisted of three courses with a few options. I got penne vodka, a Caesar salad, and chicken marsala. I also made sure to be overly pretentious (in a humorous way) when we ordered bottles of wine for the table. I made sure we had my favorite, Sauvignon Blanc. It may have not been from France, but it was still pretty good. All the food was great as well.
The Penne Vodka. I have been eating copious amount of this since returning to the US
My chicken Marsala
At the end of dinner, everyone took took turns saying something or a memory about my grandma. It was full of funny and nice stories, many I hadn’t heard before. Even with a lot of laughs, some of the stories were more emotional and I could tell people were moved due to the tears shed. Almost every person had something nice to say.
My dad was telling funny story about my Grandma and stood on a chair for some reason. It was pretty funny.
Soon the dinner wrapped up and everyone said our goodbyes. It was really nice having my whole extended family around the past few days. We hopped in the car and headed home.
By the time we got home, I was considering going to the gym. I decided against this and opted to spend my last couple hours just relaxing at home. Packing did not take long since I wasn’t taking much back with me. Aside from the clothes I was wearing, I really only brought underwear and socks plus my toiletries and laptop. This was partly an attempt to make my life easier when I have to bring everything home a month from now.
I spent the rest of evening getting some last guitar in and just hanging out with my family. We started watching the movie Moana. I had to leave halfway through and was sad I couldn’t finish it. I said my goodbyes to everyone and headed off to the airport with my dad. Fortunately I was flying out of Newark this time. This made my life much easier.
I said goodbye to my dad and had no trouble with checking in and security. I’ve been flying so much recently that it feels easy now. It also helps when you don’t have to sprint to catch your flight. I was flying Norwegian tonight and had a suspicion that they don’t serve meals being a budget airline. To prepare for this, I packed three sandwiches from lunch yesterday. This was my Aunt Joanne’s suggestion and definitely a good idea.
I ate one sandwich before boarding
I typed up this blog while waiting for my flight to board. I have a seven hour flight to Paris to get through, then a seven hour bus ride to Grenoble. Hopefully I can sleep through the entire flight. Cross your fingers for me blog readers.
Foreign Tourist with No Grasp of the Local Language 
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