I have been very blessed to have attended very few funerals in my life. Actually, I had never lost a relative that I loved so much until a few weeks ago. I know my pain cannot compare to that of my Tio Chapo's children, 23 grandchildren, 20 great-grandchildren, my Tia Nacha, or his siblings' pain but it was surreal and quite devastating.
I have been approximately 600 miles away from him for the last 14 years, oblivious to how difficult his life had become because of his cancer. I was at a safe distance visiting him whenever I went back home, talking occasionally on the phone, sharing a few laughs. And honestly in the last year or so I was just in denial, refusing to let myself dwell on the possibility of losing him. I saw him last year at a family function and I couldn't help but run outside and cry like I hadn't cried in a very long time after I saw how frail he was.
See, let me tell you about this man and his family.... Tio Chapo was the epitome of strength. My entire life he had been the one who both my mother and father looked to for advice and wisdom and help of any kind. He taught my dad everything he now knows about mechanics and diesel engines. The extent of my dad's mechanical knowledge before my Tio was how to change the chain on a ten-speed. I do not think my Tio ever, ever said no. Whether it was for advice or help, he never turned his back on my parents or our family.
You would pull up to his house and would be overcome with a sense of calm and home. You would walk in and find him in the kitchen sitting in his favorite chair by the window while my Tia walked around cooking something delicious. As silly as this sounds, their phone number and address is something I have always had memorized since I was very little just in case...just in case. They are the closest I ever got to grandparents and I am lucky that I at least had them. His voice resonated and even now I cannot get it out of my head. His presence in a room even when he was very frail in his final years was impossible to ignore. So to see him that day at the party so frail and thin and using a cane, I was devastated and shocked because that is not the image of him I have in my head. In my mind, my Tio Chapo is and will always be that jolly, large, and strong man with the thunderous voice and silly sense of humor just like in my favorite picture where I am a baby and I have fallen asleep on his Santa belly. Every time my dad's phone rings, I will anxiously wait to hear him say "Que paso Compadre?". When I go back home to visit, there won't be that warm welcome when I walk into that kitchen.
While we were sitting at the rosary, I looked around to see the funeral home just bursting at the seams with people. Family alone took up most of the room but all the other people that knew and loved him were there too and I started to think how differently we all must feel to lose him. I wondered how much different my sorrow was compared to that of one of his old friends or compared to one of my younger 2nd or 3rd cousins who didn't know him as well or as long as the rest of us. I wondered what kind of sorrow my dad would feel now that he had lost truly his best and only friend.
I know we all felt something different but this entry is for me. This entry is so that I can finally allow myself to mourn. It is to allow myself to be sad at random moments in the day when I think of him and hear his voice in my head and realize that I'll never hear it again.
Gracias Tio Chapo
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