You know, the Darwin fish made me smile the first time I saw it, and the Gefilte fish is amusing too... but... that fish is a sacred symbol to a lot of Christians. I can't help cringing a little when I see one, because I suspect the Darwin fish would be perceived by some as genuinely hurtful and insulting.
Live and let live is my motto. Also, whatever gets you through the night. I really respect the power of religion. I have seen it change lives. I suspect I would be a happier person if I were able to believe, but for me that just doesn't feel like something I have any control over.
Alert about the rest of this post - it's about other eerie things that happened around the time of my brother's death. I thought Maria and narya might find it interesting, but I suspect a lot of others might not - hence the alert. It's long, too, because there was a LOT of strange stuff.
The two weeks following my brother's death were the spookiest time of my life. It was almost as if his beliefs in meanings and portents had leaked into my world.
I had to drive to Bisbee, Arizona for the funeral - about 700 miles from the town where I live. For some reason I chose a route that included a long stretch of Arizona highway 191. It looked like a reasonable route on the map, but it turned out to include an extremely mountainous region. It was night by the time I got into the mountains. About an hour south of the last town of any size, the road was blockaded because of a forest fire. I had to turn around and go back to where I could catch another highway and devise an alternate route.
The mountain road had lots of signs with pictures of elk. I remember wondering if this were the road where my brother was killed - the stories had been a little garbled and at that point I had no clear idea where it happened. But it seemed unlikely. I passed a town called Nutrioso twice - south and back north again. As it turned out, it was just outside Nutrioso that the accident happened. So yes, I drove right past where he was killed, without knowing it at the time. It was spooky.
I decided to stop for the night in Springerville, the town where several highways met. I was exhausted, having basically not slept the night before. But I had my dog with me - I thought it quite likely that we'd have to just curl up in the car. Hardly any motels allow pets. But the one I tried, did. I was amazed. I nearly wept with gratitude. It really felt like a guardian angel was watching over me. Later I found out that my brother's body was lying in a mortuary in Springerville - that was a little spooky too.
Another weird thing. At his funeral I spoke with the friend who was riding with my brother that night. She was fine - he had been riding in front and she had time to avoid the elk. But she told me that the first person who stopped after the accident actually knew Ron. Recognized him. This was some 500 miles from where he lived. It was a nurse with whom he had once given a seminar on traditional and spiritual medicine. Another, um, coincidence.
Something rather wonderful happened too. Talking to my two other brothers during that terrible night we got the news, we discussed our brother's daughter, from whom he had been completely estranged in life. It was I who insisted, "We have to tell Natalie." My brother had split from her mother when Natalie was about 6 months old, and basically never seen her since. None of the rest of us understood this. Our mother had kept in touch with Natalie over the years; we had all met her; she was a very attractive and intelligent child. I hadn't seen her since she was 12, but I had been exchanging emails and pictures with her for the last several months. She seemed really nice. She was very eager to make contact with her father, and the rest of us were determined to arrange it. Our brother made it hard, though. At intervals one or another of us would have the Natalie Talk with him. He would listen in silence, then change the subject. I think he was just embarrassed really. How tragic that that kept him from her.
It wasn't that he disliked the very idea of her. He seemed pleased to hear that she was doing well and so forth. Once my son was using my brother's computer while we were visiting and found a picture of a pretty young woman on his desk. He asked, "Who's this?" My brother told him it was his daughter. My son was astounded. Later he ranted to me, "How can he have a daughter I didn't even know about? She's my cousin! Where
is she?"
Sorry for the long backstory. Well, I called Natalie the morning after Ron was killed. It was excrutiating. When she understood who was calling, she was absolutely delighted. Ready for a nice, long natter. At first she couldn't grasp that the father she had wanted to meet for so long was dead. Several times she said, "You mean one of my uncles was killed?" Finally she got it. Long silence. Then she said, "Is it okay if I come to the funeral?"
Of course it was okay. More than okay. And she did come, with her nice young husband. She turned out to be an absolutely beautiful young woman, pleasant and soft-spoken, with a Mona Lisa smile. We all adored her. She felt like family at once. They both did. Another spooky thing was how similar her husband's sense of humor was to Ron's - he made a couple of jokes that sounded exactly like something Ron would say. We spent the evening after the funeral laughing together. We're
that kind of family. A lot of the laughter had a crazy edge, but it's what we do. The weird thing is, it turned out that's what
they do, too.
Right after the funeral Natalie quietly said, "I missed a lot." I hugged her and said, 'You did. But he did too."
Ten days after my brother's death, a beloved friend in California died of cancer. This was not unexpected - he had stage 4 melanoma. I couldn't go to the funeral because of all the time I had taken off for my brother. Anyway, I had gone to visit several times after he been diagnosed. Got to see him and talk with him while he was alive. The last conversation I had with him was on the telephone. He was telling me what he wanted done with his ashes, and how we all had to be strong for his wife, our friend. It was... hard. Good, but hard.
I had let my mail pile up while I was in Arizona. I went through it later that day, after hearing about Mike's death. And there was an envelope with his handwriting. That just about did me in. I remember lying on the floor, howling and sobbing. I finally pulled myself together enough to open the envelope. It was a card from my dying friend, offering sympathy on the death of my brother.
I knew he chose the card himself - the print was by his favorite artist, Tom Killion:
Here's what he wrote:
Pam just let me know about your brother. What the tradgedy. I hope his recent visit brings you some peace. My sincere condleces to the rest of your family. Thinking of you Jan. Love, Mike.
I include the misspelled words and odd syntax because... the melanoma had metastacized to his brain, you see. This was a brilliant man, a scientist, a beloved teacher. Walking around the UC Davis campus with him was like being with a celebrity - young people kept dashing up and greeting him. He taught Animal Physiology 101 in the vet school. I had known him 20 years or so; he was a second father to my son. He won every game he ever played. I never knew him to make an error in spelling or grammar in all that time. But he was having trouble with words by then - speech had become difficult. He was only a week away from his own death when he wrote it. But he chose a pretty card and made the effort to write the words that no longer came naturally to him.
I'm in awe of his generosity of spirit. He's my touchstone in a way. He was for a lot of people - that one person you know who just shines with goodness and kindness. Who made other people better just because they knew him. And he sent me a message - of love, comfort and understanding - from beyond the grave.
It was the worst summer of my life. Yet there was a lot of beauty. So that's my heathen story of - take your pick - interesting coincidences, or meaningful associations.
)
At least I've known some humans who would never have graduated from a nudibranch high school.
And that doesn't make sense to me. 
Ethel.
