  Hurtling back through time and space toward the RW in Houston. Just as the blog is not RW, so were my two weeks away not RW either. Time did not hold to its regular boundaries, days took weeks and weeks took minutes. I cannot understand the order this past two weeks followed.
Grandpa died on the 14th and we left the next morning for Tucumcari. I had not been there in years. Tucumcari is this very small town in rural New Mexico that under traditional measurements does not matter at all. However, under the new measurements of hypertext theory, Tucumcari matters a great deal because there are so very many connection—links—to the town. I never cease to find people who once lived there or had a relative that did. Everyone has been through it, most even stopped for gas. In Rainman, Tom Cruise lied and told his girlfriend that he was in Tucumcari, New Mexico when he was clearly standing at a roadside stop near Gallop on the other side of the state. Grandpa was playing golf, and had just hit a forty-foot put to close his 17th hole of the day when he collapsed on his way back to the cart.
He died instantly of a heart attack at 82 years old. I delivered the eulogy at his funeral, it made everyone laugh and cry so I think it went well. I have to say it was the only personal bit of either the Rosary or the funeral Mass. Two hours of chanting, responding, kneeling, praying between the two services that could have been held for any person [sic. Catholic person] on Earth, save my little two page eulogy. We’ve gone crazy when it comes to dying in this country.
The funeral ritual was intended to be a comfort to the living, it came about in a very functional way as mankind gained a sense of mortality and hence needed to ritualize the end of consciousness. How did it become an exorcize of praying one’s soul into Heaven, just in case they are stuck in pergatory? 
