Morning all. Hope everyone is having a good morning. I slept really well last night. I think it was the thunderstorm actually. I always sleep really well during storms. Not entirely sure why, but I find the thunder and rain comforting. Anyway, I appreciate the sleep. So lets see what this morning’s prompt brings us, shall we? Timers set and implements of writing to hand? Right then, let’s go.
This was interesting. I think I started off more as a eulogy and then ended up more as a story. I think it is leading to dealing with the new shape of the world post death, but I think a lot will need to be rewritten. it is one of those prompts where an idea comes out of it, but it is more inspired by the writing done in th prompt rather than the actual words written on the page. Which is fine. I will take ideas from wherever they seem to show up.
Tuesday, June 20th: That was the day he died.
That was the day he died. I would like to say that the day was an extraordinary one. That there were premonitions of doom or dark clouds looming. For him it would have seemed appropriate. He was always involved in matters of great import and always seemed to be on the edge of a storm. It is how I always think of him. It doesn’t matter that most of the storms involved lightning dashes of words or thunder clouds of policy or the fog of controversy. I always picture him surrounded by cloudy storm filled weather.
The day he died was bright and sunny. I remember that. I remember that morning in great detail as though it was preserved in amber. I woke early and went on my morning run. The weather was cool enough that I started with goosebumps even though by the time I ended my run I was sheathed with a fine sweat.
I went to take a shower and found I ran out of body wash. I bathed with the bar of soap and mentally added the body wash to the list. As the soap was little more than a half forgotten sliver, I knew the shopping would need to be done soon.
As I finished bathing and dressing I tried to figure out when I could fit the shopping into my day. It seemed that no matter how much time I had, it always slipped away. By the time I was dressed the scent of coffee was snaking through the air. I took a cup and my scheduling issues to the back porch.
The sun was coming up and the day was promising to be clear and fine. As I drank my cup, the phone rang and I remembered my annoyance at having slipped it into my pocket before going out onto the porch.
I pulled it out and it was Sarah. She told me the news, her voice calm, flat, emotionless. From there on the amber shatters and memory deserts me. I remember nothing else of that day. My day went from ordinary to a blur. His death set in motion a chain of events. Some are the expected end events. The notification, the gathering, the mourning.
But for him there was something more. His estate didn’t so much need to be settled as it was parceled out, some of the parts under the strictest of confidence. There was the usual, land, money and all of the odds and ends gathered over a life well lived. But then there were the documents. They were my particular charge. There were those to be filed with various offices, his publisher, his biographer. There were some that needed to be shredded before anyone could see them. I remember setting down my coffee cup and then I remember nothing until three months later when the world calmed down and I was once again at my back porch sitting with my cup of coffee. The weather was colder then, turned to winter when I wasn’t watching.
Ten til Midnight 