I'll remember that entire day for the rest of my life.
Princess Diana's funeral was on
at 6 in the morning,
I got up to watch it,
and started crying ....
slowly I went to find Mark and Beth.
So strange it was to grieve
for someone I had never known
never met,
and yet such deep aching tears were coming up
from my heart, to my throat.
I went into the bedroom where
Beth was staying
She was fluffed up on pillows 3 feet high,
laughing to the point of her own tears emerging
I wondered what could bring such effortless happiness to her,
and looked at her televison
and saw the "Coneheads" movie that had to that point
riveted her undivided attention.
She paused, and looked a bit alarmed, then blushed.
"BETH!"
I exclaimed as
she jumped in alarm
" Princess Diana's funeral is
on television,
in a historical moment,
never to be experienced again
and you're watching a repeat of the CONEHEADS?!"
"NO!"
She exclaimed.
"I'll cry,
I'm watching the coneheads and that's FINAL!"
I smiled, and
said, Mark held my hand and hers, weeping at the site of the card
That moment in history will forever
belong to us Richard Bach
"OK."
"I'll go watch it,
Ten minutes
later,
and when your doe eyed children
come to me and say
'Auntie Mare,
why can't mommy tell us about
Princess Diana's funeral,
and what happened, and how it felt?'
I'll explain that their mommy,
the teacher,
was watching the coneheads on television
while we witnessed history on her behalf."
we all sat together in the livingroom,
with tissues,
in silence,
feeling the grief for a stranger we somehow all loved.
we were sharing a quiet understanding,
that said "Mommy" on the casket....
in grief and happiness,
she is and was,
my one girlfriend...
my true unconditional best friend.
Your friends will know you
better
in the first minute they meet you
than your acquaintances will know you
in a thousand years
Copyright
© 2004 Maryanne & Mark F. Chisholm. All rights reserved.