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I crawled out of bed at John-Paul’s insistance when my 7:37 alarm buzzed. I shivered into the living room and started a fire while my pot of espresso brewed. The sun is beaming through the front window, leaving puddles of warmth for the cats to snooze in. By all right, I should be plugging my work laptop into my monitor, keyboard, and mouse to send a message to my team. “Hi team! Working remotely today. Will be offline for lunch. Have a T-Riffic Tuesday!” While my e-mail downloads and my systems boot up, I should be packing John’s lunch while Robin Meade talks about terrorism in India and YouTube videos.

But the house is dead silent. No hum of BBC America coming from the furthest bedroom. No cats are frolicking. I don’t hear the sleepy dueling banjos of John and my dad snoring.

I’m trying to decide if I want to say anything at my dad’s funeral. He was really proud of me for being strong enough to give my little speech at my mom’s: “My mom kicked ass.” I don’t know what I’d say. I think it was John-Paul who told me I should tell the horse-touching story. Maybe I will.

My parents always had a Box. It used to be a Can, but then they upgraded to a small Tupperware. It was the family non-junk drawer. Important things were stored in the Box so we’d know where they were – Insurance cards, Chap Stick, winning lottery tickets, legal documents, nail clippers – All of the oils that grease the wheels of our daily existance.

In this box, I found my mom’s transcription of a phone conversation my sister had with my dad.

“Get off 21 and turn on 5 street. Right on Center. Down to Davis. Left. Aha. OK. OK. OK. OK. OK. Aha. Aha. Uh-huh, right. I got that. 5th street. Aha. Really? Yeah. OK. OK. Aha. Aha. Hon, get ready to…”

It’s nice to remember that my parents were completely silly most of the time.

Tonight at the viewing, I spent 20% of my time crying and 80% laughing. That’s a pretty fair estimation of how my dad’s life was, so I think it’s only fitting.