The Start of Goodbye

June 22, 2005 | Category: Family, It's a Trip

Yesterday started the night before. We packed, and hemmed, and ironed, and organized. Collapsed into bed so late that when the alarm went of at 5:30AM, we resisted. But eventually we did pull ourselves up and into the day.

6:30AM We started for the car, although it took about 20 more minutes before we had finished running back into the house for "one more thing" and actually pulled out of the driveway.

7:00AM Bear dropped off at Elia's, we headed to Midway Airport for our flight to Boston.

8:00AM Midway security being the clusterfudge of all time, it took us over 45 minutes to get through the scan line. They were announcing our names over the loudspeaker as we scrambled to our gate.

[time change + 1 hour]

11:30AM It is a running joke in my family that I can't get a ride from Logan Airport. Today was no different. We caught the "Silver Line" - a bus that becomes a subway. We switched over to the red line to MIT (Kendall Square).

Met up with my mom and brother and we all grabbed a quick bite at the food court. It was easy just to chat, look through the most recent Bear pictures, and share a laugh and pretend that it was just another day.

But then it was time to head over to MIT's unique chapel for the service.

1:45PM The whole family gathered in an anteroom. The lovely obituaries mention 2 nephews and 1 niece. But families are more than common blood; marriages and children created 17 people who called this amazing man "Uncle Mike".

2PM We approached the chapel in pairs as a lone bagpiper stood in the dappled shade by the entrance and played the mourners in. It finally hit me why we were there.

Mike had attended MIT from undergraduate through doctorate and then returned to teach. The eulogists had pulled his school records going all the way back to the beginning. It was bittersweet to hear how he'd always been special, always been kind and smart, always been more interested in the questions than the answers.

Another of my uncles talked about Mike, the guy. The one who loved to laugh, who joined in on games of Rail Baron, loved crosswords and was always interested in the world.

Then my cell phone went off. It took 4 rings for me to silence it.

[insert several moments of embarressment here]

His co-workers talked about Mike's amazing teaching skills and genuine rapport and devotion to his students. One brought with him a book that contained the thousands of emails the school had received from all the people who'd heard of Mike's passing and had to reach out and tell someone how much Mike had meant to them.

Most of us count ourselves lucky if we have a pond of people whose lives we touch in any meaningful way.

Mike had a rushing, roaring river.

Mike was universally recognized for being an amazing teacher and advisor. He won the sardonic Big Screw Award, the prestigious Baker Award, and at one point he had won MIT's "Outstanding Faculty Member of the Year" for 10 years straight.

At the end of the memorial, it was announced that MIT was renaming that last award after Mike.

3PM We walked up 3 flights of stairs to the reception. A long dark-clad line of solemn faces past chattering students who watched us with curious eyes.

I pulled into a corner at one point to check my phone. It had been Elia. I quickly called back and discovered that there had been a misunderstanding about the child seat but Dee had taken care of it. As I was talking, I looked up and realized I was surrounded by a small crowd of family friends waiting express their sympathy.

We walked together into the large reception room. The food was amazing, but I couldn't taste it.

I put on what CD calls my "Chatty Cathy" persona - I was engaging and talkative and accessible.

I was miserable.

4:15PM With red eyes and wrenched hearts, a cousin, CD, & I grabbed a cab back to Logan. Windows down to the hot Boston sun, we looked out at the blue water and the brick apartment buildings as we rolled by.

5:30PM There's a Legal Seafood inside Boston's airport. As we sat down, my boss call my cell phone. I answered it long enough to tell him to go away.

Then the 3 of us ordered strong cocktails and ordered food and talked about how the rest of the family was doing. As if we were doing any better.

Well, after an hour or so, maybe we were.

[time change - 1 hour]

8:00PM We landed into the Chicago sunset. Last hugs and off to our car and home.

As we drove, CD talked about the tour Mike had given him and Bear of MIT last summer - before we knew Mike was sick. Before the end began.

They'd gone to Mike's classroom and office, had lunch in the cafeteria.

Mike told CD how there's an aisle at MIT called "the infinite corridor". In what has become a sort of ceremony ("MITHenge" [thanks, Kimberly!]), twice a year all the doors along the corridor are opened and people line the sides and then, just at the right moment, the sun will shine through from begining to end.

I would like to think that, somehow, from now on, whenever they throw open those doors, Mike's spirit will be there. Traveling the sunbeam along the rows of rapt students, teachers, and staff.

[I thought I'd done with tears, but I was wrong.]

We pulled into the driveway and Bear came racing from the backyard into my arms. As I held him tight, he whispered to me "Did you say goodbye to Uncle Mike?"

And I kissed him hard. "Not yet," I told him. "Not just yet."

Share: Delicious! | Stumble It! |   Slashdot It!