Surreality

I first caught a glimpse of Matt's body through a crack in the door at the funeral home. We were late, my parents and I, on account of my long drive up from New York. It was all I could do to get out of bed by nine and on the road by ten. I didn't arrive in New Hampshire until nearly three o'clock, long enough to change into a gray suit, white shirt, and dress shoes, corral my parents, and head on up to Newmarket for the wake. We walked in and heard the priest in the middle of prayer. Matt's family was seated around a room, lined up in a row, listening to him. Through the crack in the door, right above the hinges, I could see a sliver of Matt's coffin, which was draped at the bottom with an American flag. Matt had served in the Army, but I hadn't realized he was honorably discharged. I thought his mental issues had interfered.

It wasn't until after the prayer, after we signed the book, that we walked into the room and I saw him for the first time in six years. The coffin was metallic gray and about eight feet long. The top half was open and there he was, dressed in a blue suit, blue shirt, and green tie. His eyes were closed. I didn't approach closely at first, so the details still escaped me, but it was him, a guy I'd grown up with, lying at the head of a funeral home at age 41, as if he were asleep. He had such a fucked up sense of humor, I kept waiting for him to jump up, point his finger at all of us and laugh his ass off.

People were milling about, talking and hugging in front of Matt's coffin. It seemed strange. At times, it felt like they'd forgotten that he was there, a captive audience to their conversations. A couple of times I caught myself with my back to him, and I had to force myself to turn around so I was half-facing him while I talked to people. It seemed the only respectful thing to do. It was his party, after all.

I went up to his brother Luke, who'd given me the bad news in New York, just after I'd returned from a reception with Mayor Bloomberg at Gracie Mansion. "Tim, this is Luke M--. I've got some bad news about my brother Matthew. Give me a call when you get this. I hope you can call me tonight, I'll have my cell phone on, so call me when you can." I called him back, and in the same night, traveled from the high of shaking the Mayor's hand to the low of hearing that my friend had died. I gave Luke a hug, he thanked me for coming. His eyes were wet and red. As a kid, Luke, who was two years behind Matt in school, was younger than his age, awkward and a little goofy. Now, a wife and two kids later, he appeared calm, controlled, and very much a man. Of all Matt's siblings -- originally there were nine of them, all older than Luke -- Luke was the leader. He was the one who called people. He was the one who consoled. I have no doubt that he played a big role in Matt's arrangements, since he lived only a few minutes away from where the service was being held.

I found Matt's father who looked nothing like I remembrered. The last time I saw him, many years ago, he had black hair and a dark face with an intimidating stare. Whenever I went to Matt's house, he'd walk around like he had somewhere important to be, like he'd rather be anywhere else, all serious, never saying a word. He wasn't friendly and he always intimidated me. At the wake, he was a changed man. He was smiling, clapping me on the back, talking about Matt. He'd aged significantly. His hair was all white, his face more wrinkled. He said something about Matt living the way he wanted to live, going where he wanted to go, and dying quick without any pain. "That's how we all want to go, right?" I didn't quite know how to respond. Honestly, he seemed like he was in shock. From his beautiful eulogy the following day, though, I'd learn the depth of this man, how he truly felt about his son, and how much pain he was in.

I found Matt's mother next, and she was crying. "I'm so happy to see you," she said in a shaking voice before hugging me hard. Even through the dizzy, numb state I was in, it almost made me cry. Remarkably, she looked almost exactly the same as I remembered her. Short, freckled, sharp blue eyes, and chestnut hair. She'd gained a little weight, but other than that, she was little changed from the last time I saw her. I couldn't believe it. And she still had the same thick New England accent. She asked if I was going to the funeral, and I said "Of course I am." Then she asked if I'd say a few words about Matt. I told her I'd be honored to. I learned later that it was Sister J. who volunteered me to speak, saying I could help lighten the mood with some stories about Matt. A moment later, she asked me how I was doing, if I had a special someone in New York. I said "Yeah, he's great!" She looked at me, confused, and I said "No, no, I'm kidding, it's a "she" and she's wonderful." Then she laughed and said it would have been perfectly alright if it was a "he," whereupon I reassured her and some grade school friends who were standing with us (some of whom I know believed I was serious) that I am in fact involved with a woman.

That's how it was. We were at a wake, a sad, miserable thing, and yet, we were seeing old friends, which made us all so happy. It was surreal, feeling such joy at seeing these special people from my childhood, hugging, smiling, laughing about our respective lives, while Matt lay at the head of the room, frozen in his final box. We made plans to get together the following night at a bar somewhere, to extend this reunion a bit more. Matt, however, would not be coming. He had somewhere else he had to be.

Afterwards, it was time for me to visit Matt up close. I've seen three dead bodies in my life: my grandmother, the father of a grade school friend, and now, Matt. Anne was cremated, so even though I attended her funeral and burial, I never saw her like that (which was perfectly fine with me). Even after having done it before, it doesn't prepare you for doing it again. I'd been edgy all morning, impatient with everyone, because I was unconsciously dreading the whole experience of going to my friend's wake and seeing his dead body. But I'd put it off long enough, so I excused myself and walked up to Matt's coffin.

I kneeled down on the pad and took a close look at him. He looked like he was sleeping. They always do. His eyes were closed and his freckled face looked peaceful. Then I noticed that his hair was lighter, almost blond, and it struck me that the stupid mortician must have done that. I got annoyed. Nobody better dye my fucking hair -- if I have any left -- when it's my turn for this. But his father told me the following day that it was Matt who'd gone blond to hide his graying hair. So instead of changing it back to the brown hair Matt had all his life, his father told the mortician to leave it blond. That's how Matt had it and why should he change it? Matt's hands were crossed over his chest. They, too, were freckled. I noticed a red scab on one of his fingers, an overlooked remnant of the violent way he died. He'd been hit by a car -- an S.U.V. There must have been blood. Nicks, scrapes, and bruises. They'd done a good job on him, though. He looked whole and peaceful. Still, like every body I've seen in that situation, there was a fake, waxy quality to him. He wasn't Matt anymore. The life, the "Mattness," was gone. The word "shell" kept popping into my head. That's what he looked like, a shell of himself. Take the life out of us, and that's all we are, these empty meat husks, useless slabs of carbon and water that can only lie there doing nothing. Rotting.

Luke came over while I was near Matt and we talked about how Matt was and how difficult his final years had been, both for himself and the family. I learned how Matt would pick up and just GO somewhere, anywhere -- to Memphis, to Biloxi, to Colorado, to the Blue Ridge Mountains, anywhere he wanted. When he called to tell his brothers and sisters he was in "Augusta," they thought he meant Augusta, GEORGIA, not Augusta, Maine. Matt lived off his VA benefits, but he often ran into financial trouble because of his illness. Whenever he'd lose a credit card or run out of cash, he'd call his parents or Luke or one of his other siblings for hotel money, or food money. They did their best to help him. It wasn't easy. They were perpetually worried that he'd hurt himself, or worse, hurt someone else. They lived with those fears every day. At the funeral, Matt's father compared Matt to a white water rafting trip. "A lot of the time, it got really bumpy and there were a lot of waves. But other times, it was serene and beautiful. We got to experience so many things, learned so many things, from Matthew."

I worked on a short eulogy that night. I felt drained, and honestly, all I felt like doing that night was sleeping. I didn't feel like being creative. I didn't feel like being funny. A lot of memories that I had of Matt were too crude to discuss at a funeral or were hilarious only to us. And how to convey those memories I could remember without offending anyone or making an ass of myself? The next day, at the end of an interminable Mass, a formal, ritualistic affair that gave no comfort to anyone, Matt's father spoke about him in such an eloquent, emotional way that I was dumbstruck. He sounded like a CEO who'd given 1000 speeches and who knew how to inspire people by describing his son's life in such an emotional way. I'd never heard this man speak more than 10 words, and now here he was moving me to tears.

My next, selfish thought was: "I have to follow THAT?"

I did my best. I talked about Matt's sense of humor, his laugh, his mockery of anything and everything. I conveyed some funny stories about us, some of which I alluded to in my entry last week. His parents loved it. His father was laughing the entire time. And as I looked at Matt's family while I was speaking, especially his parents, I got the strangest sense of deja vu. Seventeen years before, I'd given Anne's eulogy in Bethel, Maine, and it was her father and her sister who were looking up at me with tears in their eyes, smiling at my stories. Matt was in the audience that day. He'd driven us up, me and another friend, and we'd gotten lost. We finally arrived, so late that we almost missed it entirely. Matt was in a bad mood that day. It was May 1992, around the time his illness was probably beginning to manifest itself. He was surly and pissed off. Anne died at 23. We were all in shock and angry.

How could Matt know then that he would die 83 miles away from where we were burying Anne? Maybe his unconscious knew the troubles that were coming for him. Maybe that's why he was pissed. I've been thinking about things like that in the past week. How many times have I walked, driven, or flown past the place where I'll meet my end? How many times have I thrown on the suit and tie I'm going to be buried in? Do I own it yet? Maybe my bad mood on a given day is because I got too close to my dying place. (I must have a lot of dying places then.)

Matt died too young. He was 41. He'd just celebrated his 41st birthday the night before he died (though Luke told me he got confused and thought his birthday was actually the day before). Matt spoke to his mother an hour before he was killed, a final gift to the woman who brought him into the world. She said he sounded happy and optimistic, like he always was. That he liked Augusta and planned to stay there awhile. "The thing about Matt was, he was always trying to learn something, always trying to improve himself," she said. And it was so true. It comes through in all the old letters from him that I've been reading. He was always moving forward, always trying to be better, always exploring and seeking. His mother said he had spanish tapes in his car. His father said that one time he had to drive Matt's car home from somewhere because Matt had run into some problems, and the car was loaded with Matt's belongings and had no acceleration. "I wondered, what the hell did he HAVE back there?" It wasn't until he got home and unpacked the car that he found 300 pounds of weights and a broken down bench in the back seat. "Matt said that he needed them to work out and stay in shape," his father said, laughing.

And what is he now? Where is he now? Seeing him last Friday made me realize that there's much more to us than the bodies we temporarily occupy in this life. It has nothing to do with religion, which I've never been more down on than after that depressing Mass. It's just a realization, an understanding that there is a live body and a dead body, and it's not the body that gives life, it's something else, something mysterious and powerful. Even believing that he's taken a different form now, it was hard seeing him like that, especially knowing how hard those final years were for him. An illness he didn't ask for or deserve. One that even with medication is not easy to predict or control. It all has made me quite sad, and I think it's hitting me late. I was on autopilot for awhile there. Now it's setting in. I'm sure by now, Matt has been reincarnated and is on to his next life. Maybe he's a female baby in Thailand this time. Maybe he was the next baby born in Augusta, Maine the following morning. Whatever he is, wherever he is, Matt is now whole again and restored. Whether spiritual or physical, Matt has a new life.

Me? I'm just trying to get through this one.