Last one I swear

Since this is mostly a self-indulgent site (considering only Kelsey reads it) I don't feel too guilty having the majority of my blog content be of things regarding the death of my uncle. Buuutttt I do want to move on, and considering that this morning was the funeral this seems to be a pretty good time to do so. So here goes, last post regarding this.

We got to Judy's house last night (recap: Judy is my mom's cousin and both were incredibly close to Uncle. In fact he raised both of them for at least a portion of their life) and stayed the night because the funeral was at 9:00 am the next morning. We talked about my grandma and went through some documents that Uncle had. One of these was the marriage certificate of my great-grandparents (his parents) from 1922. That piece of paper is over 87 years old. How crazy is that? And it's practically in perfect condition. I found out a lot more about my mom's side of the family as well. Apparently there is a cousin Ruth that still lives in Kentucky. That seems crazy to me. I only really thought of Uncle and my grandma as the extent of my family on my mom's side. And apparently my mom went back to visit aunts and uncles in Kentucky with Uncle and my great-grandma Belle. 

I also found out a little more about Uncle's death. Some miracle allowed Uncle to be completely clear and able to speak and be understood right before he died. Judy said that he was crying, balling in her words. He said he just wanted to die. He just wanted to go home. He wanted to go to sleep and wake up home in Kentucky. I guess that's his heaven. Apparently there's a Metcalfe grave plot on a hill in their hometown in Kentucky. Uncle expressed some interest in being buried there while he was on his death bed, but in the end he was buried in Mansfield. According to my grandpa the burial plots in Kentucky are incredibly overgrown and haven't been maintained. 

Funerals are weird. There's the open casket, and he looks almost like a wax statue of himself. Not to mention he had lost a tremendous amount of weight in the hospital. My brother had recorded a video with Uncle about 5 years earlier with a very detailed interview about his life growing up and his experiences in WWII. That was nice to have because he looked and smiled like Uncle in that. It's nice to have that memory of him rather than the memory of him in the hospitals. There were roses that were in a pot that said Uncle on the said. There were about a dozen roses in there. Uncle was an incredible gardener and always had beautiful rosebushes when he was young enough to tend to them. We all lay a rose on his coffin at the burial site. 

He had a military service, which meant TAPS and the 21 gun salute (7 guns fired 3 times). Lee was presented with the flag (Lee is my younger cousin - about 12 - and he and Uncle adored each other) and the empty shells. It was incredibly sad, but I couldn't help thinking "he's finally home. Just like he wanted". So it was difficult to be too sad. 

I almost forgot. I also met some more family. Two of Uncle's cousins came to the funeral: Ken and Ernie Lewis (Lewis was grandma Belle's maiden name). They live in Columbus now, but they were great people. It was really fun meeting them, and especially fun hearing my mom talk about people she knew and places she went that I hadn't even heard of before.

 If interested below is his obituary which has a few more facts than the lifestory  I posted earlier:

Uncle