Reunion Beach Elin Hilderbrand (best selling autobiographies .TXT) 📖

the buffet was made and served with love (except for the bucket from the drive-thru, and you could argue, even that was given with a generous heart).

Love everybody was the lesson, no matter what they brung.

That’s what I miss the most about life back home. You can get along without the ocean, sand, and sun, but you would be hard-pressed to thrive without people who love you. In the South, they build people who know how to love. You get it, Dot. You always do.

Love ya, Pat

To: DBF

From: PC

Forgive me for the last couple of postcards. I imagine I’m trying to explain the place I am so you might feel better about dying someday. You always said you never wanted to die, and I didn’t either, but it’s what comes eventually to anyone that is born, so it’s wise to get used to the concept sooner than later. Some things about death as perceived by the living remain true. You hear about death mostly at funerals, and I know you heard these comments at mine, so I’ll run a few by you in the hopes that the truth from me will give you some comfort.

He’s in a better place.

That’s partly true. Better in many ways, okay. But the place part, let me explain. This is not so much a place as it is a state. It’s an ongoing feeling of peace, the same feeling you get when you’ve turned a book in on time and you know it’s pretty good, maybe great, and the relief washes over you, after which comes the pride, in a job well done. You know the book is good and you’re not even slightly tempted to call every snob you know and let them know that you hit your deadline and they can kiss your ass. There’s none of that here. You finally know what it feels like not to care what anyone thinks. The afterlife is satisfaction followed by a nap. A soothing nap.

He didn’t want to die.

No, he did not. But he did. And it was not a bit frightening. It was confusing until I figured out what happened and accepted the new state I was in. Yes, it was chaotic. It might have something to do with the fact that I was shouting, “Am I dead? Will somebody answer me? Am I dead?”

He saw the light at the end of the tunnel.

Not exactly. I saw nothing but haze. It was then that I tried to remember every book or television show on the subject of near-death experiences. I remembered a long interview on The Sally Jessy Raphael Show that featured a psychic who wrote books, can’t remember her name but you will. She wore a wig. You said her hairdo, an explosion of weird wiglets, looked like the ones you wore to your senior prom. She came on the show and admitted that she had been dead several times. That could not have possibly been true! Say No to Tarot! Remember this lady? She spoke of voices and her mother and all that, and at the time I said to myself, I hope that’s how dying goes! Wouldn’t that be nice? But it turns out that there isn’t a band to greet you—you sort of join the souls, and everyone is everyone, all one, if I may be so blunt.

I recall that book by the surgeon who fell off a moped, then into a coma, and when he emerged from it, wrote a book about it. You know who I mean. Remember you gave me that book as a gag gift one Christmas? You know, it was written by the brilliant surgeon who crossed over and saw goo and then a beautiful garden? I’m here now, and I still have no idea what he was talking about. There’s no goo. There’s no garden. Maybe the hospital put something in his IV and he had hallucinations. I’ve yet to see a butterfly here. Let’s get back to what people said when I died.

He was too young.

Maybe. Seventy years doesn’t seem old when you’re 68. Or even 65. In some ways it felt very old to me. But here’s the thing about age. Any age at time of death is too young unless you’re 115 years old. And even then . . .

He had so much left to do.

Not really. I pretty much said what I needed to say and tried to write what I wanted to read. In that regard, I was blessed. I made a living doing what I loved the most, and here and there, folks loved what I wrote, which was heavenly. That’s all I could do, Dot. Tell it like I saw it. And when a reader took my work into his heart, I knew it. Every single time. They were moved and their emotional reaction moved me. It was the perfect exchange. A tale well told in exchange for loyalty and affection. I would say that was close to divine.

Love ya, Pat

To: DBF

From: PC

Why was my funeral a circus? From my point of view, it looked like the aerial shot of the Homecoming halftime show of a Clemson football game. I swore they even spelled PAT in formation on the church steps. Did they? Maybe it was your idea. You can be grand, in the best of ways. You are also a good friend. You showed up. You were there at the service. I got that one glimpse and that was enough for me. For a man who hated to put on a necktie or shoes that squeaked or, God forbid, a suit, it was something to behold. I guess all the folderol was to let people know I was important. But I never was, even on my best day, anything that bordered on important. Maybe I was slightly interesting. That’s a different kind of important, at least to the person living the life. But there you were, Dot, crying like you were at the front of the