The paragraph was written in 1998, almost twenty years before he died. My father had written that he never wanted to be cremated, and that he had told his brother exactly why. He said it wasn’t about religion or tradition, and it wasn’t something he’d changed his mind about. He wrote that he’d made his wishes clear because he was afraid his wife would “make the decision for everyone” if he ever couldn’t speak for himself. I read that sentence again and then looked at the date on the letter.
My aunt said there was another letter from the same year, but she hadn’t thought it mattered. In that one, my father mentioned a conversation he’d had with his wife about what would happen after he died. He wrote that she’d laughed when he told her what he wanted and said, “You’ll be dead, so you won’t care.” He had apparently answered her very calmly, but he’d written the conversation down afterward because he wanted someone else to know. And then he named the person he’d trusted to make sure his wishes were followed.
That person wasn’t me. It was my aunt, the same woman who had handed me the box six years after the funeral. She said she hadn’t known about the letter until recently, and when she read it, she realized she’d been the person my father was talking about all along. At the bottom of the page he’d written one final sentence, and it explained why he had never told me directly. “If she says I changed my mind, don’t argue with her — just show my son this letter.” I sat there holding the paper and realized my father had left me an answer twenty years before I ever knew I would need one.
