Smoke between the flags

 

"She's got some years on her, doesn't she?" said the woman walking toward us cheerfully with her somewhat less cheerful husband. "But she's perky." She was wearing a cap with a Maryland flag on it; he was carrying binoculars. We were at the top of the cemetery, having spent time with Ola and Hoku at the Lilith salon. The woman wanted to know where the crematorium is. Her mother is getting cremated today. She didn't want to witness it, but she did want to watch the smoke rise into the sky. "Something sacred about that," she said. Her mother had died in a muumuu with flags on it. She loved flags. "You'll see the smoke between those two flag poles," Ola told them, which made the woman happy. Her death had been sudden, but her mother had been 90 years old, "had a good life." The woman (white, in her 60s) had come to Hawai`i since the late 80s to work in the archive; ten years ago, they moved here. As Lilith and I walked downhill, she and her husband drove by in a black Chevy; she waved. "Did you see the smoke?" I asked. "No, but it's ok," she said, smiling, through the open window.

 

 

Addendum: The woman remarked on how pleasant it was to stop and talk to people. Ola was especially kind to her. I mentioned the Lilith Walks books. "Maybe we'll be in the next one," her husband remarked.