A Perfect Finish Dedication
Dedicated to Trula Jane Love
Who names their child True Love? She went by Jane, but True was more fun. She married into “Kay” and “Tipton” and finally died “Sattison.” I wished she would have gone back to “Love.”
Jane was born poor, but worked hard all her life. She always liked me because I also worked hard. She was a looker, almost to the end. Her daughters complain about her philandering, but I met her much later and wasn’t directly impacted by whatever mistakes she may have committed. She divorced then buried her first husband, my grandfather. She buried her second husband. I worked a lot for her third ex-husband Delmar–dug ditches and painted barn roofs. With my uncle Allen, throughout my high school and college years, we helped Jane leave Delmar about ten times, then move back in. Allen lobbied for putting casters on all her furniture.
They had separate economies, on account of the kids. But they had a deal involving a joint account in which each had deposited $5,000. Whoever died last got the dough, and I never visited without each of them pulling me aside and explaining their plans and intent to prevail and score the prize money.
They had moved into a farmhouse which was rented to us when we first relocated to Indiana from Colorado.
Hanna and I had just graduated from Tuck. I brought Hanna home to meet the parents and we made the trip to see Jane and Delmar. I was moving to NYC and wanted to sell her my car because she was stranded miles from the armpit of the universe. Delmar had broken her car pulling a tree out of the woods.
We sat in her living room located five miles south of Butler, Indiana drinking cold pops. Jane asked Hanna, “Where are you from?”
“I’m from Sweden.”
“Where’s that?”
Hanna was stunned, but replied, “It’s in Europe.”
Jane hollered, “Delmar, she’s from Europe!”
During that same visit, Jane told Hanna, “I’m a quarter Indian. Chris’ mother is a quarter Indian. And Chris is a quarter Indian.”
From the dining room, Delmar admonished, “Now Jane, that’s not the way that works.”
Her memory had just begun to wane. She was on a twenty minute loop. “Do you want to see upstairs where those kids slept? All four of them in one room. Can you imagine that?”
Hanna was a sport and followed her up the stairs twice. On the second round, Jane fell down the long flight of stairs–no damage. She asked us to go to the liquor store for her and gave us twenty bucks.
Delmar told us Jane shouldn’t drive. Delmar was really skeptical about the car for Jane, but for the right price, he’d let her buy it and drive it himself. We went on a test drive with Jane at the wheel. Hanna and I were literally crouching in the backseat with our legs up on the tops of the front seat as Jane raced north on two-lane Highway One weaving fully across both lanes into the weeds on both sides and topping the hills at seventy miles per hour in either lane. Yeah, well, on this particular matter Delmar had it right: no way in hell that woman should ever drive again.
She wasn’t married for her last twenty years, but that didn’t stop Delmar from picking her up, first from assisted living then from the Alzheimer’s ward for conjugal visits. My mother objected, but Jane had signed a form permitting it and the home stuck by her wishes, even after she could no longer recognize him or anyone else.
Delmar won the dough. I visited him following her death. He gloated excessively and from that point forward always referred to Jane as my mother, not grandmother. From what he said, I could tell he missed her, but he also spent quite a lot of time talking about his dead first wife and other possible new conquests. “I can still shake a leg.”
I called Delmar a few years later, after he had given up the farm and moved in with his daughter in Indianapolis, right before he died. He was excited to speak with me–he always liked me.
Jane’s Eulogy
Here is the letter I wrote to my mother which she read at Jane’s funeral:
Dear Mother,
There is not a lot one can say to make the passing of a loved one easier, especially when that loved one is a parent or child. We shall all miss her daily, and I’m sure you’ll miss her more.
We happen by throngs weekly, yet we are seldom so lucky as to meet someone who really leaves such an impression as your mother made on each person she met. Jane was endowed with true grit and character. From the beginning to her final days, these attributes remained. Loss of memory is a horrible thing to endure, yet Jane managed it as well as anyone can. That notwithstanding, let’s not allow our most recent impressions of her to eclipse her finest moments.
She was, of course, beautiful. Her sense of humor and wit were boundless, and without pretense. Rarely do we meet someone so capable. If she said something, it was so, and if it wasn‘t so, then she made it so. She had such energy and drive. Do you know anyone who works so hard each day as she did? She considered it commonplace, yet we know that it was truly extraordinary.
Those that befriended her were so lucky to have met her, and those that crossed her didn’t cross her twice. She was polarizing. She surprised people. Amazed them. Stunned them. And if they got in her way, staggered them. She left an impression as she went about her way. She made a difference. People could choose to like her or not, but they couldn’t help but take notice. I really liked all those things about her.
Jane cut to the heart of every matter quicker than anyone I know, and that is saying quite a lot in our family. . . think of that for a moment. Don’t you think that many of her qualities remain with us? Look around. We are all like her in many ways. I believe we have her, firstly, to thank for many of those characteristics, which define our own personalities. So, my dear mother, I give my thanks now to you, and to your dear mother for all of that. She is gone, but the sweet memories of her shall remain with me for as long as I remain.
May God bless and rest her soul, and may He comfort you and your sister and brother during this time. I’m so sorry I’m not there now, but my thoughts are with you.
All my love,
Christopher