Requiem Aeternam

Requiem aeternam dona eis, Domine,
et lux perpetua luceat eis.

Kyrie eleison,
Christe eleison,
Kyrie eleison

My father died 44 years ago today. You see him smiling, vibrant. He lives on smiling, vibrant. He had a heart attack while playing golf on a sunny, summer Tuesday morning. Newspaper accounts said he watched his drive on the first hole come to a stop and then crumple to the ground. He was playing alone.

I was playing in a little league playoff game that morning. We had another game that afternoon. I was leaving for the afternoon game having just finished lunch. Father Weber, the pastor at St. Gerard, was walking up our driveway. He was a family friend who socialized frequently with my parents. It wasn't extraordinary for him to be visiting. His face was ashen. I greeted him with a smile and wave as I hung my baseball glove from my handlebars. He said nothing and put a hand on my shoulder and guided me back toward the house.

We entered, my mother came to greet him. "Martha Jane," he said, "Phil has been taken ill in Gaylord." Ill? He's sick? He's going to be fine? Right? My young mind raced. My Irish mother began to wail. The banshees wailed along with her. I tried to leave to go play the afternoon game. Father Weber stopped me. "Stay close to home, Sam. You'll be needed." I held out hope that he was sick, that he'd be fine. He'd be home. I locked myself in the bathroom and closed my eyes and mustered my thoughts and my fears and tried to invent a reality in which he hadn't died.

Soon my sister was brought home from her job. I ran to the driveway and told her, "dad had been taken ill in Gaylord." She knew what it meant. She ran into my mothers arms. They wailed. Word spread soon. The house filled with family friends. Father Weber led a rosary and we knelt and prayed for his soul. The world then alternated between vicious high-velocity spins and excruciating moments when time slowed and reality glared directly into a young boy's heart.