We had a nice sendoff for my father on Wednesday. About 50 of us got together at The Lambs’ Club, an organization founded in 1869 in England, and in 1874 in New York. It grew out of dinners made up “of lively folk of the theatre and the arts” at the home of Charles and Mary Lamb in the early 18th century.
I like that, since I teach that period of British literature.
It’s always been a convivial place. The grand dame for decades has been Joyce Randolph, Trixie on The Honeymooners.
I’m happy to report that Joyce was there last night to see dad off. I’m afraid I was talking to her when she was trying to get at the buffet table, so she looked up at me and said: “You’ve left me with just a crust of bread on my plate.” Which I did. But she said it with a smile, and eventually got fed.
I led with the photo of me being obviously hilarious, mostly because this is my blog, but my brothers Kevin and Colin were in fine form as well. We all spoke. Kevin and I played some trombone music, accompanied by my brother from another mother, Roland Wilson. He’s the one who took the first two of these pictures, and the guy on the left in the third one.
We talked about dad in a way I hope and think he would have appreciated. Kevin read one of his famous stories, a parody of Coleridge in the NY Daily News (see previous post). Colin gave a heartfelt tribute. I read a few of the openings from his mystery novels. Five of his six begin with a quote from Marcus Aurelius about death: ” ‘Life is more like wrestling than dancing, in that it should stand ready and firm to meet onsets, however unexpected,’ ” advises Marcus Aurelius” is the way A Brand X Murder (1999) begins. The others are filled with similar wisdom.
Dad never talked about his own death, but he wrote about it in general quite a bit. So we didn’t talk about his death either. We focused on the life at The Lambs’, then ended up at a bar across the street for more of that.
Parkinson's Disease Diary 