know that Annie used the pen and notebook to plan her own funeral. A traveling funeral. She did not know that the pages she’d found folded over when Annie fell asleep were the directions to all the secret and wonderful spots that helped make a remarkable trail. She did not know that Annie’s writing was a simple journey back to reclaim a portion of what was once alive for those who remained, for those she loved, for those she loved beyond all the others. She did not know that while planets of grief and sorrow started swirling around the sons and friends and colleges and the young boys and girls in Memphis and Orlando and Princeton who had read about Annie’s own brush with death years and years before and who knew that she was really, finally dying again that Annie was smiling and laughing at what she was planning.
Her traveling funeral. A place beyond the yard she loved to watch and the faces she memorized with all the photos she asked Marie to help her line up against the front of the dresser. Marie did not know that she was a key player, that her placing the pen in the perfect spot and never reading the notes and holding open the covers and making certain that the medicine and the baths were just the way Annie liked them—all these things, she did not know.
“What did you think she was writing?” Katherine asked.
“I never thought about it. It was not my place to imagine or intrude. It was not my place to look over her shoulder or to dare to read even one word that she had written.”
“I understand.”
“I respect them, you see, Katherine. I know you get this because Annie talked about you, because I have met you and looked into your eyes. I know when to ask some things but mostly those who are dying . . . they have so much to think about, so much to remember, so much to imagine. There is no time for questions.”
“I see, I do see.”
Silence guides them for a few moments while Katherine imagines Annie and Marie sitting just this way, in the quiet. Marie is monitoring some bodily movement, the flow of the medicine, the way the IV drips from the machine into Annie’s thin arm, and Annie is swept away with her writing, her planning, her traveling funeral.
“I’m wondering now why you are calling about this funeral,” Marie says. “Annie would know there is no way for me to leave without weeks and weeks of preparation. She would have known this even as she was planning it.”
“You know what you meant to her. You know what you must mean to all of them.”
Marie knows. She knows as she watches a brave slice of wind bend the hands of her favorite tree into what she thinks looks like a graceful prayer, hands moving to windy music, the music of her aching heart.
“Of course. I am the last resort. I am the one last stop before they have to start all over again. I know. I do know.”
“Marie, she wants you to come on the traveling funeral but she knows you would have a hard time leaving your patients. She wrote about it. She called you the Mother Teresa of Sonoma County. The living gift to the near-dead. The heartbreak before the pills. Well, she had a list of names for you. I will send them all. But she also had this idea.”
Marie starts laughing. She sees Annie as she was the first days, when they were getting settled into people they would become. Laughing. Everything was funny. The tubes and bottles and the way she turned for the shots and how she made everything seem light, at first so easy and even at the end there was always something positive.
“What’s so funny?” Katherine wants to know, laughing just to hear Marie laugh. Then adding hastily, “Does this seem weird to be laughing when we are talking about Annie’s funeral?”
“It would seem funny not to laugh.”
Then they laugh together and Katherine catches it first. The irony of this laughing, which she is sure Annie would have predicted and wanted and hoped for during this very conversation.
“She was always full of ideas.
Her traveling funeral. A place beyond the yard she loved to watch and the faces she memorized with all the photos she asked Marie to help her line up against the front of the dresser. Marie did not know that she was a key player, that her placing the pen in the perfect spot and never reading the notes and holding open the covers and making certain that the medicine and the baths were just the way Annie liked them—all these things, she did not know.
“What did you think she was writing?” Katherine asked.
“I never thought about it. It was not my place to imagine or intrude. It was not my place to look over her shoulder or to dare to read even one word that she had written.”
“I understand.”
“I respect them, you see, Katherine. I know you get this because Annie talked about you, because I have met you and looked into your eyes. I know when to ask some things but mostly those who are dying . . . they have so much to think about, so much to remember, so much to imagine. There is no time for questions.”
“I see, I do see.”
Silence guides them for a few moments while Katherine imagines Annie and Marie sitting just this way, in the quiet. Marie is monitoring some bodily movement, the flow of the medicine, the way the IV drips from the machine into Annie’s thin arm, and Annie is swept away with her writing, her planning, her traveling funeral.
“I’m wondering now why you are calling about this funeral,” Marie says. “Annie would know there is no way for me to leave without weeks and weeks of preparation. She would have known this even as she was planning it.”
“You know what you meant to her. You know what you must mean to all of them.”
Marie knows. She knows as she watches a brave slice of wind bend the hands of her favorite tree into what she thinks looks like a graceful prayer, hands moving to windy music, the music of her aching heart.
“Of course. I am the last resort. I am the one last stop before they have to start all over again. I know. I do know.”
“Marie, she wants you to come on the traveling funeral but she knows you would have a hard time leaving your patients. She wrote about it. She called you the Mother Teresa of Sonoma County. The living gift to the near-dead. The heartbreak before the pills. Well, she had a list of names for you. I will send them all. But she also had this idea.”
Marie starts laughing. She sees Annie as she was the first days, when they were getting settled into people they would become. Laughing. Everything was funny. The tubes and bottles and the way she turned for the shots and how she made everything seem light, at first so easy and even at the end there was always something positive.
“What’s so funny?” Katherine wants to know, laughing just to hear Marie laugh. Then adding hastily, “Does this seem weird to be laughing when we are talking about Annie’s funeral?”
“It would seem funny not to laugh.”
Then they laugh together and Katherine catches it first. The irony of this laughing, which she is sure Annie would have predicted and wanted and hoped for during this very conversation.
“She was always full of ideas.
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