Maw

Yesterday, June 29, 2023, my wife’s last living grandparent was buried in Krotz Springs, Louisiana, next to her husband, Albert, who preceded her by 20 years. Lucille Patsy Wanda Aaron Ortis (yes, you read that correctly), or “Maw,” as we called her, was a little over a month shy of her 96th birthday. My father-in-law, Gene Ortis, a former minister, officiated and had organized the proceedings along with his brother, Karl, also a minister, and sister Diane. It was a fine service, as good as any funeral I’ve ever been to. “Jesus puts the ‘fun’ in ‘funeral,’” they quoted their mother as saying, and they didn’t disappoint. My mother-in-law, Gaye Lynn, joked following the service, which was carefully structured and paced to last little more than an hour, that Karl and Gene ought to take their show on the road. It would be the same show, mind you — their mother’s funeral — but a well-done show it was, all agreed. I’m convinced many ministers prefer funerals to weddings. My own father, also a former minister, said as much.

In her final years, Maw’s mind and memory had faded significantly, and it could be a challenge to converse and relate to her as she was prior to the effects of advanced age. But this wasn’t shared during the proceedings. It didn’t earn any attention, in fact, over the course of the hour. Instead, it was evident to all that the sum total of her life’s actions was guided by an unabashed love for Christ and, in turn, for others. If I reach a similar age upon my own passing, I would expect to be present for my memorial only my immediate family or similarly-aged contemporaries, if there were any left by then to attend; in other words, a sparsely attended service. Not so with Maw. Seated in the full chapel were both friends and relatives aged anywhere from 9 to 90. A scan of the room, sermonic words aside, was more than enough to inform that this person’s life mattered, that her time was very well-spent not in insular pursuits, as we are typically encouraged to pursue in life, especially American cultural life, but in the interest and care of others.

Time. As we age, or “mature,” as one of my doctors recently referred to it, stating that they aren’t supposed to use the “a” word, this “t” word seems to move faster as we lose more of it. I’m a few days shy of 47 as I write this, and, hence, just around the corner from inclusion into the esteemed ranks of the AARP. It’s difficult to fathom. It doesn’t frighten me, per se, the idea of aging. It’s just that you rarely feel the age that you are, or at least as you perceived it would looking ahead from the vantage point of younger years. Then again, there are the moments it doesn’t seem so unbelievable, as you find yourself critical or incredulous of current popular trends when you occasionally catch a glimpse of them, usually via your children’s interests, and realize you’re acting your age quite well. I couldn’t identify Post Malone, whoever he is, from Adam, but apparently you can currently acquire his collector’s cups with your purchase from Raising Cane’s. That’s no encouragement for me to buy their delicious, savory chicken strips for my next meal, which should suggest to me that I may now, at my age, have at least begun phasing out of their marketing strategies that target younger whippersnappers who appreciate popular musicians with face-tattoos.

In any event, time is slipping away. I may have less of it ahead than behind. “How am I spending it?” the question comes glaringly to mind.

How do we spend our time? How do I spend it? The majority of mine is consumed with my kids and their needs, of which there were many this past week that left me exhausted each and every day. Followed by this are the needs of my wife, who spends the bulk of her waking hours as our professional breadwinner, for which I have enormous appreciation and who I’m therefore happy to serve. Whatever is left is for me, I suppose, and the exhaustion usually just finds me wasting away in front of the television. I used to read much, much more, which you would expect of a former career librarian, but there you have it. I woke up this morning at my in-laws’ with the intent of getting some rare playtime on my recently Father’s Day-gifted NES classic, but here I sit writing instead. It seems a better use of my time, I must say, if for no other purpose than reflection, though I expect I will end up nostalgically indulging on the Nintendo soon enough for a little “me time,” as they call it.

We’re all about “me time,” though, are we not? Granted, we all need it, but I feel we’re encouraged to overdo it. Our phones and the accompanying apps are designed to hook us and consume our attention, whiling the seconds, minutes, and hours away as the sun sets once again on another day of mostly “me-time.” Many of us are guided by what will make us happy in our lives, and so we pursue those things. My wife and I landed on an episode of “House Hunters” yesterday and watched as a young, attractive DINK couple made the decision to search for a place to live in an exotic, foreign locale simply because they had the “travel-bug.” I admit there is nothing necessarily wrong with what they were doing, but I couldn’t help, following Maw’s passing, asking myself how they were choosing to spend their time. They had no connections there, and it appeared there was little interest in making them. The decision had more to do with what was going to make just the two of them comfortable and happy in both the short- and long-term. Again, not to criticize, but I couldn’t help but ask myself, “How are their funerals going to play out if this is their life in the foreseeable future?” Perhaps they had no such concern. But it seems to me we should.

I enjoy travel as much as the next person, and I need to unwind. We all do. There’s no inherent harm in hobbies. But one can have too much of a good thing. This is more true, I realize, the more time I lose to too much “me-time.”

I didn’t spend a great deal of time with Maw. But Maw spent an enormous amount of not simply time but of her life on others. She wasn’t remembered for staring at a screen or directing her pursuits toward whatever would solely make her happy. Her reward? At the end, a room full of people of all ages and backgrounds who were better off for her chosen efforts to connect with each of them, due to her belief in a good God that chose to connect with her. She wasted no time.

All of us want to feel significant. None of us, I think, would say we want to waste all of the time we’ve been given. But, oh, how we waste it on things of little consequence to anything other than ourselves. I had very little time with Maw, and I did not know her well, but when she was spending her time with me, her attention was indeed on me. That’s what I’ll remember. It’s a worthwhile lesson for the time I have left, else I unwittingly choose a life full of “me-time” and receive only a hollow and empty memorial, void of remembrance.