Ephemera reminding us that stories are how we achieve immortality

My mother passed in the spring of this year after a long and adventurous life which took her to all corners of the world and allowed her experiences and opportunities which could never have been imagined when she was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1932.

I have inherited her papers and am slowly making my way through boxes of materials which range from genealogy to reunion and school annuals to mementoes and family news and correspondence.  A lot of work but also a pleasure.  And among all those records and notations and essays, there are all sorts of little mysteries.

Sometime in 1995-96, she was asked to make a presentation at a class reunion, which she did.  In the manila envelope with the program materials, her notes, drafts, and final speech, I found a peculiar document.

It was originally a four page list of classmates who had already passed on.  Name and cause of death noted, sometimes date.  Presumably a heads up by the event organizers to my mother as a presenter. 

For me, everything is potentially data and scanning list was intriguing.  The results in rank order for the 45 classmates who had died in the 45 some years since graduation.  All sorts of issues with category definitions but interesting none-the-less. 

Cancer - 7

Car accident - 6

Heart attack - 5

Military - 5

Suicide - 5

Unnamed cause - 5

Stroke - 3

Leukemia - 2

Aneurysm - 1

Arthritis related - 1

Choked - 1

Diabetes - 1    

Emphysema - 1

Liver failure - 1

Plane crash - 1

Car accidents, military service and suicides all struck me as much higher than I would have expected.  This was the age cohort that would have served in either or both Korea and Vietnam, so that might be a confounder.  Still, interesting.

But what really caught my eye was something else.  On the back of the last sheet, in someone's unfamiliar hand, there is a poem.

I have a friend - 

I cannot hear her voice,

I cannot touch her hand,

For she has gone ahead of me,

To a far and wondrous land.

I loved my friend - 

We shared life's joys and sorrows,

The secrets of our youth,

We laughed, we cried, we grew

'Twas a friendship full of truth.

I miss my friend - 

But death does not end friendships,

For memories linger long,

And, Oh! what Joy to meet again

When it's my turn to travel on.

To which my mother has appended her own personal note:

I do believe, by remembering them in our hearts and minds, these friends are with us too.

I couldn't agree more - culture, civilization, standards - they are all the result of codes transmitted through stories.  We remember the people, we remember the stories.  We remember the stories, we remember what we have learned.

The learning is critical but the stories are wonderful.  

UPDATE:  Further along in the stack of paper I eventually come to an email in which my mother notes that she has written a poem for use and passes it along to the publishing committee.  The above poem.  So now I know the authorship.  Mama!  But whose hand is that in?  Did Mama quote the poem from memory for a friend who wrote it down and then left it behind?  Who knows.  I am glad it survived though.