Tuesday, February 24, 2015

Celebration of Life

I woke up this morning feeling peace and happiness.  I stayed in bed for a couple of hours and relaxed; played on the internet.

I finally pulled myself out of bed and got ready for my first task of the day: music.  I realized my CD burner in my computer wasn't working and I needed music for tonight.  My first stop was at Graywhale.  I didn't exactly find what I needed, but I did find a couple of CDs that Josh would have loved.   Only one CD would have been suitable for public listening.  Let's see, Butthole Surfers, Agnostic Front and Social Distortion.   I love Social D, but the other two are not exactly my kind of music.  Josh would listen to a lot of punk and I would only tolerate it.  I'll listen to them for him.  :)  I've sampled both CDs and so far I'll listen to them on special occasions.  haha

Unfortunately the Social D CD was not the one I wanted and so I headed off to Walmart (it was the closest store, but I could hear Josh rolling his eyes at the thought) to look for more.  While I was looking through their selection I suddenly had a thought to call the mortuary and ask them if their music system could just have an MP3 player attached.  Hurrah, they can!   I went home with two more CDs - Johnny Cash 16 Biggest Hits (for tonight) and the Guardians of the Galaxy Awesome Mix Vol 1 (for me).

I didn't mind the music trip because I had a fun time music shopping.  Plus one of Josh's favorite songs was Spirit in the Sky by Norman Greenbaum and I was able to get that from the Awesome Mix CD.

I drove home and made a playlist on my iPod Nano of Johnny Cash, Social Distortion Greatest Hits (a CD I already had), Spirit in the Sky and Flogging Molly's CD Drunken Lullabies.  I also put together everything I'd need to the celebration.  I then sat down to wait...

My dad arrived and I anxiously needed to do something so we drove to Taco Bell to grab some food and brought it back to my house to eat.   Then I sat down to wait... it was 3 p.m. and we didn't have to be there until 5 p.m.

At 3:30 I snapped and said I had to go.   So we drove to the mortuary and set up.  At 4:15 all was complete for our part so then it was just another sit down and wait...  ha!  I forgot my cell phones!  I left them in my other purse and my wonderful sister had to pick them up for me.

Thankfully some people started showing up around 5:10 and then more and more people.  So many people came tonight!  Most people were friends and family who knew both of us, some only knew Josh, others only me; but all that mattered was that there was a large turnout to support me, my family and celebrate my wonderful husband.  I can't even begin to say how grateful I am for that.

My friends from Alorica (Josh worked there too), my friends from IHC (they were there when we married), and my friends from HCA came.  I am so awed by that.  Those are my current job and my last two jobs.   Wow.

I was happy and strong the entire time, until near the end.  It was very overwhelming.  I started to get anxious and close to tears a few times.  I gathered as many hugs as possible from people.

The best part of the evening was the Zombie cake, made by the great and wonderful Michelle.


Seriously...



I love it.

We also had tacos and three other cakes that Michelle made (chocolate w/ peanut butter icing, vanilla w/ vanilla icing, and red velvet w/ cream cheese icing).  Hmmm mmmmm..  

I went home and put everything away.  I pulled out the cards that people brought and read through them.  I finally allowed myself to let out a good cleansing cry, wiped my eyes and remembered I'm wearing makeup.  Fudge pickles.  At least I waited until I was home for that mess.  *sigh*



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