Hillbillies-R-Us

There is really nothing funny about the death of a friend, and yet, when that friend is remembered I think he would have enjoyed this last story about him very much.

His widow and his daughter chose to have the service at one of his favorite places on their land, a place where every spring he hosted a music festival that he called "Rock the Valley." And since his body had been cremated it was possible to do that, have a lovely service in a beautiful and familiar place, and in the end, put his cremains in one of the places he was happiest.

But then we come to the Pilly part of the story. I never can remember to tell everything, you know. You know how lawyers have that thing called 'assuming facts not in evidence'? Well, I'm no lawyer, but my brain does have a habit of assuming you've heard the details somewhere else and will, therefore, fill in the blank spots in my conversation.

So there I was at the emergency room (never mind that part because it doesn't have anything to do with the story) and I was passing the time with my sister-in-law's best friend, Jerry, and the subject of this great funeral happened to come up.

On account of if you're at the emergency room at night for any reason at all your mind just naturally seems to run to funerals, I don't know why. It's a rule. I don't just make this stuff up and I already said never mind the emergency room, so just forget the damned emergency room, okay?

So, anyway, we were talking about how they had this beautiful box made of barn boards for the remains and how it took place out in this beautiful field and how the band played music and then after awhile the widow and daughter went off for a private moment, and it was so hushed and lovely.

And as I'm telling this story the woman seems to get more and more distressed, which seemed weird to me as she had never met the man. And she kept looking so horrified that I began to think maybe she was just one of those people who can't stand to think about death or maybe has a great phobia about funerals, but as this was such a nice funeral I couldn't see what part of the story could be bothering her.

So eventually we all went home and nobody died and the whole emergency room thing worked out. But the next day I talked to my sister-in-law and it turned out that I had forgotten to say the part about how our friend was cremated.

So the mental image I was so descriptively giving was one where we built a box of barn boards, tossed in the corpse, drug it out to his favorite field and then at some point the widow and the daughter heaved it onto their shoulders and went into the woods, returning without it and God alone knew what they were doing in there.

And this would almost certainly make Steve laugh and wish he had planned it just like that, too.

The world will be a colder and quieter place without you, my friend, and I would give up writing altogether if I could trade the gift to have you back with us for awhile longer. I am grateful for what you did and were for my son, you were one of the people that carried the music to Jake because Scott was gone and couldn't, it breaks my heart that you are gone, now, too and one more link in the chain has broken.

But as long as there is kindness and love and laughter, as long as there is music, you will not be forgotten.

The drummer may be silenced, but the beat goes on.

In loving memory of our friend, Steve Holcombe.