Today began with a shopping list and the sorting of laundry and then suddenly a funeral.

It was my friend L. who told me. She had dropped off her younger son at AJ�s old preschool and had heard the news about N�s dad. She called me from her car, knowing that I don�t usually read the local paper.

The funeral was in 45 minutes and the wake had already started. I sprinted into the shower where I started sobbing. I didn�t have time to think about exactly why.

According to the dates inscribed on the brass urn placed on the altar by A, N�s mother, N�s dad died Saturday, one month shy of his 35th birthday and ten days short of his seventh wedding anniversary.

Funerals for anyone are not particularly happy, but funerals for the young are tragic at a whole different level. There was no violence in this death. There had been time to prepare. He didn�t die in the hospital hooked up to a million machines, but at home with his family. But it was gut-wrenchingly sad.

The first thing I saw when I walked into the wake was the face of W, N�s 2-year-old brother, peering over the shoulder of someone I didn�t know. W has a persistently worried look on his face. It�s something about the wideness of his blue eyes and the angle of his eyebrows. He smiled and waved. Next I found N himself in his blue suit and striped tie, sitting with his cousin and a family friend at a table drawing pictures. I gave him a hug and then found a group of teachers from AJ & N�s preschool. We stood around talking about other things until the service began and we all walked to the chapel.

A looked extra pale in her black dress. At no more than five feet tall with flame red hair, she could have been the picture of pity, but instead she looked strong. Sad but strong.

There are some definite rules at funerals. One is that you shouldn�t laugh too loudly. This was easy to keep. Another is that you should turn off your cellphone. A surprisingly large number of people violated that one. The third one is that you should not allow your own expression of grief to upstage the grief of the family of the departed. I complied with this last one, but only at great personal exertion. Instead, biting my quivering lower lip while the tears came out my nose. I kept a handkerchief I�d borrowed from my husband�s second drawer in front of my face through much of the service. I probably looked either as if I was hiding or as if I was going to vomit.

It seems wrong sitting politely in church. I wanted to cry. I wanted to cry not so much for Bob (N�s dad), because I didn�t really know him all that well, certainly not as well as I know the rest of his family, and also because I�m pretty sure that he was ready. The suffering had been going on for a while and I�m sure he was tired. I think I was crying because of the two little boys, who remind me of my own. Because I was reminded that some things cannot be fixed, no matter how much hope, prayer and effort are involved. Because doing the right things is not enough. Because things don�t make sense. So I sat there for an hour and twenty minutes, poised between rage and grief, biting my lip and thinking about W.H. Auden.

It didn�t help that the cantor had a fantastically beautiful voice. The one thing you can usually count on in Catholic services is bad singing. Bad singing helps in these situations, because it�s a distraction, something to make fun of. But the voice soared crystal clear over the muffled sounds of the 150 of us who sat there listening. It was the tragic flip side of the scene in On Beauty where Howard is undone by a glee club.

W dozed off on a relative�s shoulder in the middle of the sermon, which concluded with the one moment where I could not hold it in. The priest got down on his knees in front of N, who was sitting next to his mom in the front row, and started talking directly to him. N listened, very still, and held his mom's hand.

And then suddenly, the bell began to toll and we were out on the street where people were checking their cell phones and rummaging in purses for car keys. And life is back to normal for most of us. But for some, not really. For some it won�t ever be quite the same. We all said goodbye to Bob in church. But we could also have said goodbye to A and N and W, because next time we see them, they will not be the same people they were.

My soul is very sad.

10 people said it like they meant it