Sunday, February 26, 1984

2:02AM, phone rings twice. 2:14AM, phone rings until I answer it. Mom is dead. A hospital nurse told me that she died a few minutes ago, but the official time of death won't be until the doctor arrives. 3:42AM, I had a headache and went to Mom's room to get an aspirin. Mom's digital clock was flashing 2:08AM, and won't change to 2:09AM. I watched it for about five minutes, then reset it. I checked all the other clocks, fuses and electrical appliances for a power surge or outage; everything was as it should have been. I rechecked Mom's clock at 4:08, 4:33, 5:23,7:08 and 10:04 AM. Her clock was working perfectly.

I called Mom's relatives at 5:50AM The phone lines to her whole hometown were down until then. They want to bury her in their family plot, which leaves Dad out in the cold. I still have Dad's ashes in an urn. I arranged with Dad's sister for him to be buried in their family plot, whenever I get the money for both of them to be buried.

Mom has made me executor of her will, but when my child lived with Mom for a month, Mom changed the beneficiary of her burial insurance. If Mom was going to make my child beneficiary, she should have made her the executor too, to prevent confusion. My child will have to declare the $1,000.00 insurance money on her income taxes, but Mom's final expenses will have to be paid too. Then out of the remainder, someone has to pay Mom's bills. I will have to end up paying them and be in debt as usual.

I'm wondering why we must have a funeral home as the middle man for cremation. The high cost of dying is $125.00 for cremation, $42.00 for the cardboard box to put the ashes in, $450.00 for picking Mom up at the hospital and taking her to the crematory, putting an obituary in the newspaper, doing all the paperwork associated with dying and bringing ashes to me. Although I genuinely like and admire my ex-classmate, who family owns the funeral home, I've decided I don't want to be Road Commissioner or a publisher, I want to be a Mortician and own a funeral home.