Originally Written: January 2020
Revised: November 2024
Yet, there’s one place where the closest seat is the unenviable one. Not because it’s less physically comfortable. It’s actually the most comfortable in the venue. No, this seat only comes at a significant cost – the loss of a loved one.
This unenviable seat is the couch at the front of countless rows of chairs in a funeral home.
At nearly 30 years of age, I have been to countless funerals, but I consider myself lucky to have never lost anyone incredibly close to me until this month.
This month, my favorite aunt died one week after her 67th birthday. I was fortunate to have visited her and had one last good conversation before she died. It was half a surprise, half not, but that didn’t make it any easier.
Eleven years earlier, she had been diagnosed and, by some miracle, successfully treated for pancreatic cancer. She was never one to go to the doctor but decided to go in because of stomach pains after one of her medications was changed. She thought it was a side effect. It turned out to be pancreatic cancer. A curious doctor questioned the stomach pains, which resulted in an abdominal scan and early diagnosis.
She was lucky.
Being a candidate for a Whipple procedure to remove the pancreas and surrounding organs made her even luckier. Only 30% of patients qualify for the procedure, and the five-year life expectancy is 6%. Aunt Marlene made it 11 years. She was one tough cookie and continued living her life how she wanted.
Aunt Marlene was the wife of my mother’s oldest sibling, Thad. They had no children, so their substitutes were nieces, nephews, and many loving dogs. I have many aunts and uncles, but Aunt Marlene was special. We both loved classical music and musical theatre, which she introduced me to.
She was an accomplished pianist but didn’t enjoy playing in front of people as her mother forced her to perform for guests. It was a special treat when she did, especially for her famous Christmas Day party.
At first, visiting Aunt Marlene and Uncle Thad’s house meant my family came over for an afternoon. I would dart for the piano and attempt to make music. Before I started becoming more serious, teaching myself and then later taking lessons, Aunt Marlene would teach me little duets that we would play. As I got older, she would always joke about how she had to teach the children that came over the duets, so they weren’t just hitting random notes and didn’t have to resort to Twinkle Twinkle Little Star or Mary Had a Little Lamb.
As I got older, in junior high and high school, I would ride my bike to her house in the summer and spend the day or an afternoon with her. We would have lunch, talk a lot, and, of course, play the piano. We would go through the music books and come to West Side Story or Fiddler on the Roof, and she would insist that we watch the movie before we play it.
After they moved up north to their summer cottage full-time, the piano traveled with them, and I found myself making regular trips to visit; my friends and significant others were always welcomed with open arms.
Shortly after her death, my uncle told me she wanted me to have her piano—a 1914 baby grand from the Detroit piano maker Nobel. She had purchased it herself. It now sits in our front room and gets played almost daily. Over the past year, a local Grand Rapids piano technician has restored it to keep it going for another 110 years.
Since it arrived in the fall of 2020, having Aunt Marlene’s piano has been a bittersweet reminder of our relationship and countless memories. I am fortunate to have known her as I did. To be loved by her as I was. While I still hold that a place on the comfy couch is still an unenviable one, I am reminded of the quote by Aldred Lord Tennyson, "'Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.”