The Ubiquitous Casserole

I met Patricia by helping my aunt make her food as she went through chemo. It struck me as ironic that I was holding a tray of baked ziti as I walked into the funeral home for her memorial service yesterday.

But this is just the way things are done. There is something about tragedy that inspires casseroles. I guess it seems a little rude and disrespectful to get up from a funeral and immediately have a pot luck. Gosh, I'm sorry, have some chicken!
Shouldn't we at least wait until our loved one is cold?

Actually, I rather think the whole pot luck idea is fitting. Somewhere deeply burried in our subconcious is the knowledge that, just as death is a part of life, so too, there is life in death. We must eat and breath and cry and remember that life continues. And maybe life and death aren't as opposite as we've always believed. They are one-- different expressions on the same face of God.

We are born of love and pain, and when we die, we leave those who love us to hurt. What can we say to bring comfort in the face of this? How can we express the hope we all cling to that life indeed, goes on? There are no words. So we say it with lasagna.