B E B E R E

Buñuel Moment #1:

Along with Grandpa's, there was another wake taking place at the funeral home. After things quieted down, the manager made a little joke about the difficulty of having two Polish funerals at the same time, given how everybody's name was so hard to pronounce. We laughed and talked a bit about hooked-on-phonics and Polish names(The key players on our side were ZAHN-droh-VEETS and Tack. The other family? Say it aloud: "Where's your house key?").

Joking done, back to business: plans had to be firmed up for the next morning, names taken down for the breakfast, etc. The manager let us know that Grandpa looked really good, that the other guy being buried looked worse than him and was 20 years younger. Asked us if we wanted to see. Sure. Why not?

We walked over to the other visitation room to take a look. It was just like ours: opulently appointed (Second Empire), flower-filled, dimly-lit. Same soft music playing. Very similar-looking bald head in a casket. In fact, the only way one could differentiate the two would be by the color of the caskets.