Corona Virus Quarantine Day #36: Going Postal: April 25, 2020

My day started early with the infant living I our house…by infant I of course mean the puppy.  Then Fletcher waltzed downstairs and I seized the opportunity to get some good snuggles in.  The two of us watched a bit of the Little Mermaid, his favorite book currently and snuggled on the couch.  At one point he looked up at me and said “Mommy, I love you so much!”  Oh man, my heart about melted.  I will remember this moment the next time he’s acting like a crazy man!

When everyone awoke we had a nice breakfast and Fletcher and Fiona started a snail collection.  He even named them, “Happy, Slimy and Grumpy and Lotso Huggin Bear, Fletchy, Mommy, Daddy, Grandpa, Zoey.” He was convinced that one of them was having a baby as something seemed to be coming out of the snail shell.  I’m not gonna lie, there was a very small snail shell in there that looked like a baby snail.  Admittedly I realized this wasn’t likely but they were convinced so this resulted in me googling how snails were born…and no, they aren’t born like Fletcher and Fiona were claiming, their eggs are buried in dirt and 2-4 weeks later they hatch (you are welcome for this random piece of knowledge you now possess).  So Fletcher did not witness a snail childbirth.  Thank the LORD.  He did, however, talk about it a lot today.

 

The level of excitement about these snails was too much for me to handle. 

I didn’t think the day could get much better than how it started and I was right.  It didn’t get better…it got weird.

I’m going to apologize in advance if I offend anyone with my use of humor in a sad and completely bizarre turn of events.

As most of you know my Uncle Pat passed away a few weeks ago.  He lived a hard and troubled life and sadly, he died alone.  Because of Covid-19 we could not hold any kind of service or memorial.  He died in a nursing home in Chicago.  When he passed they had to decide what to do with his remains and how to get them to my mom, his next of kin.

Long story short, Uncle Pat was cremated and it was determined that he would be shipped to our front door.  As if that concept isn’t weird enough…today this situation took an even more bizarre turn of events.

The kids and I ran down to the mailbox around noon hoping to have mail from friends and family as we do most days…inside there was a snail and a large box. The kids were super excited to see another snail we could add to our booming collection and that someone may have sent us a present.  I wouldn’t define this box as a “present” per say.  Once I reached in for the box and saw what was written on the sides and top I realized what we were dealing with.

Uncle Pat’s ashes were in a cardboard box in my mailbox.

Yep, feel free to read that again. I know if I hadn’t lived it I would have to read that twice.

I’m guessing most of you are scratching your head on this one, as was I.  How in the world did they ship a human being in a small cardboard box and not even bring him to the front door?  If I wasn’t laughing, I would have been immediately irate about this.  That came later.

Mind you, the kids were with me so there were a lot of questions.  “Mommy does crem-a-tated (they didn’t quite pronounce it right) remains mean?

What to do?

Do I answer that question honestly or just brush it off?  Before I could really give it a lot of thought the words “it’s your Uncle Pat” just burst from my mouth.  Oops…my bad.  That led to a lot more questions.  “His body is in the box? Like his whole body?”

Then I had to explain cremation…which was followed by a lot of words, most of which meant…disgusting.

I am still stuck on the fact that they just shoved his remains in my mailbox at this point. Small details like that…you know?  This is obviously not the way I imagined explaining this to my kids but I was so flabbergasted by this I was clearly not thinking straight.

I mean, I’m not a mail carrier and I realize this is weird time for everyone and their job is stressful but…come on.  If you see the words “cremated remains” all over a box…wouldn’t you think to yourself, “oh man, this is a tough day for this family.  I should take this sucker to the front door.”

When I told Bryan he said maybe they didn’t know…ummm…I’m pretty sure they knew.  You can’t really miss it.  It also says signature required…and I think it’s safe to say they ignored that.

In the days of social distancing I would NOT have expected a cheery greeting or even for the mail carrier to put it in my hands, but at least put it on the front porch and ring the doorbell…right?  We are talking about a human being here, not an Amazon delivery of books or board games.

I can’t get past it.

This was for sure the strangest thing I’ve ever experienced.  Carrying Uncle Pat from the mailbox to the door being bombarded by my kids questions in between tears and laughter was just about enough to push me right over the edge. Also, I should mention, the box was heavy which really weirded me out.

Then I had to deliver the box to my mom.  I suppose in a weird way, Uncle Pat performed his last generous act on Earth today.  Gaga and I have been fighting and had barely spoken for almost an entire day.  It was nothing major, stupid stuff…mostly that just we both have stresses and haven’t left the house in 6 weeks, and we offended each other.  We very rarely fight and when we do I’m a mess.  So the last 24 hours had been restless tense ones.  Then Uncle Pat arrived.

When I brought him to mom and set him on the bed we looked at each other and after a few seconds laughed about the insanity of it all and minutes later we made up!  Then we cried.  Then we laughed some more. I mean seriously does this not seem like a scene from Saturday Night Live?  Or something from punk’d? I half expected someone to jump out with a camera crew and say “just kidding!”

You guys…this. Was. A. weird. Day.  I am sure in a year I will look back on this day and say to my mom “remember when Uncle Pat was put in our mailbox” and we will have a good laugh/cry.  It’s really not funny but I don’t know any other way to deal with it to be honest.

My night was capped off by a “massage” from Fiona. I was required to keep my eyes closed and I learned why pretty quickly.  My massage started with my own perfume being sprayed on my back.  Then she used one of those wet hair brushes, with hair still in it by the way, to “scratch” my back.  This was followed by her sticking a Q-tip in my ear.  That was a pleasant surprise compared to the freezing cold towel she placed on my back.  Then I got more of the hairy brush “scratching” my back before she finished up.  I seriously can’t make this stuff up.  It was beyond special.

I’ll chalk this day up as a weird one but one that made me laugh in ways I never thought possible.

Kayak captains! 

My little quality control helper!  

Ellen brought some sunshine into my world today with this beautiful piece of art! 

Everything can be made better with music.  Later today after the mailbox experience Fletcher asked if we could cook pumpkin bread together.  The whole time he sang songs from The Greatest Show, mostly “This is Me”…my favorite one.  I captured this one without him knowing…”everything you ever want…everything you ever need”!  My heart.

Stay well my friends!

#celebr8awesome

#dorseyshenanigans