Closets, closets, closets, closets

Today we worked on the two linen closets and one clothes closet:

We met with an estate lawyer, Kevin Baird, Lewes, DE to get some advice. Nice guy, very helpful. We stopped by my mom's bank to give them a copy of the death certificate. We stopped by the cable company to return some cable boxes etc.

This evening we went to my brother's house. We had take-out Chinese food and watched Oceans 8. Both were meh.

Upon returning home we realized that the carpet/furniture cleaners were coming tomorrow morning at 8am and sadly the floors and furniture were covered with unsorted clothing and linens. We scrambled around to clear all the surfaces and are now ready for the 8am appointment.

Laura made it back to Sevilla, tired, but intact. I'm driving up to Newark on Sat to catch my flight to Sevilla via Lisbon on Saturday evening.

Dump Runs

The sorting of items from my mom's house continued today. Jo-Anne worked the phone to deal with all of my mom's accounts, financials etc. Kathy and I made dump runs. We got to be pretty friendly with the attendant at the landfill. The landfill itself was pretty interesting. I've always been mesmerized by heavy equipment, so I stared at the loaders for a while during my visits:


After the dump, we straightened out the cable/internet/phone issues. Basically, we closed my mom's account and reopened a stripped-down account in my sister's name. I had to set up the internet again as well as the phone and tv. It went relatively smoothly. I couldn't help but rename the wifi to "ImpeachTrump".

Shine came to the house and adopted Spike. One dog down, three to go. Later she sent photos of her two little girls playing with Spike. Big win for him. I think he'll be loved and well cared for there.

Donnie and Midnight seemed to miss Spike. They looked out the front window for a long time afterwards:

Emily and Rachel made it back to their respective homes without incident. Laura is somewhere over the Atlantic on her way back to Sevilla as I write this. I miss them all and am looking forward to getting back to Sevilla with Laura even though I've enjoyed my time here in Delaware with my sibs.

Cold Beach

This morning we met at my mom's gravesite for the interment. This was a short ceremony and again, the weather was a windy biting cold:

After the interment, we returned to my mom's house and hung out with family the rest of the day. A popular pastime was looking through photo albums. Rachel found this treasure much laughter ensued:

Emily cuddled with Spike and Donnie, two of my mom's 4 dogs. They're sweet and Emily really wanted to take Donnie home with her.

Their lives are about to become very different. One of mom's long-time nurses is adopting Spike. We are currently looking for homes for the remaining 3, though we have a couple of solid fall-back positions if we can't find suitable homes.

In the afternoon, it warmed up enough to consider walking along the beach. Jo-Anne, Laura and I walked the boardwalk. I've never really been to the beach in January. It's blustery, but beautiful:

Icicles hung from the jetty:

The iconic Dolles sign on the Rehoboth Beach boardwalk:

We had one last dinner together at Crabby Dick's before Laura, Emily, and Rachel left for Baltimore. Rachel head back to Miami at 5:30am tomorrow from BWI. Emily goes to Santa Barbara at 6:30am. Laura then drives up to Philadelphia to catch her 6pm flight to Sevilla. It was particularly sad parting. I suppose that's the result of the somber reason for our being together. Somehow knowing that we won't be together until at least the summer (if not longer) is more painful in the wake of my mom's death. Such is life.

Funeral

My mom's funeral mass was at St. Edmond's Catholic church this morning at 11am. Pall bearers arrived at 9:15am in a biting wind with temperatures around 15F. We carried the the casket from the hearse to the altar around 9:30am. A private viewing followed until 10am, followed by a public viewing until just about 11am.

The funeral mass was well-done. The priest was one that knew my mother well and he delivered a touching homily/eulogy. The cantor was talented and did a respectable Ave Maria. A long-time friend of my mother, Jim Chmelik, gave a stirring eulogy at the end of the mass. Jim has known my mom for going on 40 years. They met when they both worked a warehouse job in Gaithersburg, MD. Oddly enough, Jim now lives in Idaho and one of his sons goes to Walla Walla Community College. A weird coincidence to say the least.

After the mass, we put the casket back into the hearse. The interment will be tomorrow morning. Folks gathered at my mom's house afterwards. We put out some trays of Mexican food from La Tonalteca, one of my mom's favorite restaurants. It's rare for all of us to be in the same location. We had a nice time catching up. My sister Kathy managed to get a photo of a lot of us:

We spent the rest of the day there with people trickling away until it was just my family, Jo-Anne's family and Kathy. The lack of sleep caught up with me and I fell asleep on a love seat on the sun porch for 4 hours. I suppose the rest of them had a nice time, haha. My sister Kathy learned how to "floss":

Delaware to Baltimore and back

Spent the day going through photos in my mom's house. Here's one of me at my sister's graduation from William & Mary in 1985. That's my dad on the left, my brother, Keith, and my sister Jo-Anne:

My mom's 4 dogs have spent most of the day outside and out of the way. The poor things:

Luke is in the middle of his semester at GVSU. He's doing a bit of homework in one of the lulls:

Katie Jo is sorting through photos for a collage to show at the reception after the funeral:

Laura, Jo-Anne and Kathy made a huge amount of progress sorting through stuff in the basement:

We made a run to Home Depot for some boxes. The sunset was brilliant and the full moon impressive:

Emily arrived here in Baltimore from Santa Barbara at 10:30pm. We're killing time in a diner near the airport waiting for Rachel's flight (90 mins late):

We're looking at getting back to Delaware at around 3:30am if all goes well. We're due at the church for the funeral at 9:15am. It's gonna be a rough day tomorrow.