A couple of weeks ago, my friends and family convinced me to start a blog. I was all set to dive in, describing in ludicrous detail the latest of my misadventures. Then, life intervened. My family lost our true north when my beloved Uncle Sonny died. All the silly things that occupy my brain fell away, replaced with shock and shattering grief.

But there was something else: Precious time with my family. And, like any family, we mourn in our unique way. There were tears, stories, and photos; humor, absurdity, and exhausted laughter; comfort and time-honored rituals. In the spirit of family – what it means and how it ties us together – let’s examine some of those rituals.

This is why turkey sandwiches depress me.

I’m not entirely sure why our default comfort food has always been one of those divided disposable aluminum trays piled high with deli meat. Or, for that matter, why the chief mourners in this family immediately worry about what all the drop-ins are going to eat. Do the drop-ins expect to be fed? Won’t a neighbor bring over a casserole later today? Can’t we order pizza if anyone is hungry? After my mom died, I swear to you there was lunchmeat in our house within an hour. And that was 8:30 on a Sunday morning. I don’t ever want to see stacks of capicola before noon – and certainly not when I’ve just lost my mother.

I’m pretty sure it was the aluminum tray from my grandfather’s death that reappeared (because nothing disposable was ever disposed of in our house) every New Year’s Day, serving up our Club crackers and my father’s famous cheese dip. Happy New Year, Pop-pop.

You’re gonna wear that?

Do you remember Strawbridge & Clothier? Duh. If you’re from the Greater Philadelphia area, of course you do. Best place for funeralwear. How do I know? Because some combination of the women always made a panicked trip to Strawbridge’s, looking for the just-right outfit to convey several important things: Our respect, of course; Mass-appropriateness; the illusion that we had lost 10 pounds (despite eating three pounds of ham for breakfast); and our level in the mourning hierarchy.

Perhaps my favorite fashion moment was when my aunt showed me the tasteful basic black suit she would be wearing to her mother-in-law’s funeral – several weeks before her mother-in-law actually shuffled off this mortal coil. Best to be prepared, I guess. To this day, I still don’t know why we ended up at Strawbridge’s anyway.

In the interest of full disclosure, I feel compelled to confess one of the most ill-advised decisions of my early 20s. In retrospect, maybe the afternoon of my father’s wake wasn’t the very best time to make my first attempt – ever – to conduct an at-home waxing of my upper lip. But I just kept thinking of all those people hugging me, and looking at me, and I was already going to look a wreck and the stupid lip situation was only going to make it worse. How was I to know that hot wax is incredibly hard to control?

Moving on…

I never expected to write my very first personal blog about death. And what may seem like a somewhat flippant treatment of the subject is far from – it’s a celebration of the people who have brought me this far. In the end, we needed the sandwiches, and none of us cared what we wore. It’s always been about the togetherness. In those first days of grieving, we needed to be with the other people who would live the new normal with us, who understood what was lost. We still do – and I know that Uncle Sonny would love that.