Five weeks after the diagnosis, my grandmother was dead.

She was a proud, stubborn woman from the Appalachian Hills.

Too proud, too stubborn to see a doctor, until she'd lost 40 pounds in the cancer at her

fully in its throat.

The cancer's victory is what brought me to my first wake.

I've been lucky growing up.

While both my grandfather's died before I was born, my parents were healthy.

That was where my grandmother's, until...

Well, one suddenly wasn't.

I didn't know death until I was an adult, and Grandma Joe had passed.

This being my first go-around?

I didn't know what to do for the wake.

Dress black?

Looks sad.

Seems like a good start.

Drilled my Jeep to a lovely, pearl white funeral home that I'd passed so many times as a

kid without realizing one day.

One day I'd be its guest.

Got into a fender bender at an intersection in front of the rocky funeral home property

when I was a teen.

It seemed like a lifetime ago.

Walked into the inviting space for the first time, felt the immediate, oppressive quiet

...