Amazing Grace

37/365:

I am sure grandpa would have gotten a kick out of tonight.  Yep, he would have laughed his head off.

First off, there was a small flower dilemma.  Each of Grandpa’s daughters had ordered one of the three flower arrangements for tomorrow’s funeral.  The girls all ordered from the same company, same person, same phone call, just used different credit card numbers to pay. 

Problem #1: The flowers were supposed to arrive yesterday, on the first day of Grandpa’s viewing.  They showed up late this evening, after the second day of viewing.

Problem #2: The first arrangement to arrive was beautiful (not the problem), but when the other two finally did arrive, they looked “anemic” (problem).    

One would assume that all the arrangements for one event would be fashioned by the same flower shop.  However, the casket spray and one of the side arrangements was sent to one florist shop, while the third arrangement was sent to another shop.

What could we do?

“Sam’s is open for another hour…”  We sped to Sam’s, snatched up all their white and red roses… then drove through Starbucks for a lil pick-me-up :)

With the two side spray’s transported into the kitchen, the girls got right to work.

The before…

 There was lots of disassembling, re-assigning, pointing and foofing… 

 Till everyone was happy.

 They should go into business, yes?

Secondly, there was a song dilemma.  We simply could not find an agreeable version of Amazing Grace… not quite sure why, I mean there are only a thousand versions, sung by thousands of musicians out there in cyberspace…  We needed something that would be easy to sing along with, preferably one sung by a deep, manly voice, one that was not too slow, a version that was not too overdone…   

An hour and a half into our search we desperately called Chelsea over to audition for us.  She sounded great, one problem: she definitely did not have that deep masculine voice Grandma was looking for.  We were ready to scratch the song entirely, as it was now approaching 1am, when Steven saved the day.  Grandpa’s good friend Jimmy Jet had sung the song and recorded his version onto a cassette tape that Grandpa had stashed away.  After fumbling around with the stereo (i.e. cassette player) for a bit, we had ourselves a suitable version of Amazing Grace.  Hooray! 

Additionally, we got our answer as to why we couldn’t find the “right” version of Amazing Grace two hours prior.  When we flipped the tape over and pressed play, the voice reverberating through the speakers was unmistakable.  

It was Grandpa’s voice.  An incredible, unexpected gift.  A gift that transported us all back in time.  

To the days when we would all dance around in the living room, as he sat playing us a tune.  

To before he was sick, when he could sing like there was no tomorrow.

To the times before the encumberment of his oxygen equipment encroached upon his ability to do what he loved.

Us girls danced around tonight.  To Grandpa's voice.  Just like we did before.  We sang along with his voice, “…hey, good looking, whatcha got cooking…”  We laughed.  We cried.

Yes, grandpa would have loved today with us.

But, in reality, he was in a better place.  A place beyond our wildest dreams.  I do not doubt that today Grandpa was singing out a more beautiful melody… completely unhindered… full of unspeakable joy.