Of Funeral and Handcuffz

As I had mentioned in an earlier post, the elderly next door neighbor had died.  She treated Josh like a grandson and to Josh she was the grandmother he never had.  Oh he had a grandmother but she wasn't much of one.

Josh works as a cook at night and so he couldn't go to both viewings but did get out of work early to go to the evening one.  Josh usually walks to and from work, even tho there is a car he can use, and that night, on his way home, two cops stopped him.  Their reason was .... ready?... he was wearing a hat and a winter coat and carrying a bag.  So he ended up in handcuffs.  Apparently the police had been looking for a guy earing a hat and a coat and carrying a bag.  It's winter hoo haas.  Of course he is going to wear a coat and a hat.  As for the bag, he takes his own knife to work.  We got it for him at Christmas and it comes with a platic sheath for the blade so he doesn't dice himself while he was carrying it.  So , of course the cops go tall over him about the knife and he kept explaining he uses it for work but doesn't leave it there because it is HIS knife.  So the police take his ID and do whatever it is they do and the next thing Josh knows is that he is unhandcuffed, given back his bag and knife and the cops get back into their car and leave without a word of explanation or a "Sorry".  Needless to say, Josh didn't make it to the viewing.  He was so pissed.

I can, sort of , understand the cops' actions.  There is this mentally ill young man who is wandering the neighborhood.  Joey carries a hatchet with him and a bag so that the shadows that are after him don't get him AND he has been known to threaten people with the hatchet, peep in windows and generally creep people out.  I don't know if Joey is dangerous but the poor boy is so ill.  Here's what's rankles... Josh must be about 10 to 15 years older than Joey.  Joey and Josh don't resemble each other and Joey is even smaller than Josh.  Now I do know that the police are trying to run him out of the neighborhood but come on.  They should have checked Josh's ID immediately.  The cops had been to the neighbors' house when Nan died, even talked to Michael and I about our fire.  In fact the neighbors are the ones who told the cops that Joey had been released from jail.  So if they had looked at Josh's ID they would have known he wasn't Joey.

Josh did make the funeral, but was late,, because the younger funeral goers had been told that the funeral was at 11;30 instead of 11.  But Josh did get to be a pall bearer.

The funeral was beautiful.  There was lovely live piano music.  It was what Evelyn deserved.  That and more. 

The people at the funeral could not have been a nicer friendlier bunch.  I have realized how socially awkward I can be and usually don't know how to interject myself into a group.   But these wonderfully people just drew me in as if I were family myself and I am forever grateful. .

And yes, I did have my cry, though not where anyone could see and I made Becky, the grown daughter, wear my hat at the cemetary despite her protests that she doesn't wear hats.  It was too cold not to wear one and my coat had a hood.  So I just pushed it down on her head and told her to hush.then I found myself directing people to chairs as if I were running the show.  See.  Awkward.

After the funeral it was food at the place where Josh, the grandson next door and the grandson's girlfriend works and Josh's bosses had the nicest things to say about him.  They love his work ethic, his sense of humor, his cooking and the fact that he sings away in the kitchen when he works. They also mentioned the Ravens' hair doodles that I've been making and Josh has been giving away until nearly everyone has their feathers and glitter and ribbons.  Now it's time to make glitzier, over the top ones for the Superbowl.  The Ravens are bound to win... Josh isn't shaving or cutting his hair till the superbowl and doesn't care if he looks like, in his words, a Sasquatch.  Ah my son the cryptozoological beast.