The Day Before Memorial Day – May 24, 2020

I decided to not start the morning as I have been each Sunday since mid-March with the local obituary notices in Rochester’s Democrat and Chronicle. You can spot the old people in our suburban neighborhood – we are the ones who still have print newspapers delivered each morning. On Sunday, the New York Times is delivered and adds weight to the ever thinning D&C. This morning a quick glance at the front page of the Times startled me. There were no colored pictures, nothing but dense, tight print. The headline: “U.S. Deaths Near 100,000.” It felt like holding a vaporous, paper thin Vietnam War Memorial. So many names. So many tiny stories.

I wasn’t always, but now I am a reader of obituaries and like to see what people come up with to mark summarily a person’s life in this world. It’s been difficult to keep up these days. The names are coming quickly and so many.

I made my coffee, took the paper upstairs, arranged pillows, and read. Names. Ages. Towns. One or two lines culled from newspapers around the country. Short as tweets. The music makers, the caregivers, the quilters, the business owners, the great cooks, the new grampy, the church choir members, the dancers, the life of the party, the car lovers, little lives, big lives.

This one stopped me:

Cindy Lou Mack, 62 Waverly, N.Y., enjoyed her daily coffee with her mother-in-law

It is now Wednesday and it is her mother-in-law I think of. I think of her drinking her coffee right now. Maybe she’s looking out a window. Perhaps they had a special place, a diner they liked to go each morning. Or, could be, she used to wait each day for her daughter-in-law to bring over Dunkin take-out. I wish I knew her so that I could tell her I’m sorry.