they have to send out for one; I suddenly know how amused she would have been; that her height in death, as it so often had been in life – in selecting clothes and boyfriends – would be a snag.
I ask to have an open casket because I have not been allowed to touch her or to say good-bye. Her make-up is crucial because she would want to look natural and her lips may be blue. Oh, the thoughts that keep bombarding my sluggish mind. I can’t stop crying. There is a tight searing pain in my chest as though my heart is tired and will maybe stop beating at any minute. What a relief that would be. Just to be unconscious of what is happening around me; to escape the dreadful pain and loss.
My husband requests large bouquets tied to the gum trees lining the avenue up the hill towards Helderberg College where the Church service and burial will take place. So, we spend all of the rest of the morning collecting the hydrangeas and agapanthus and make twelve large bouquets tied with blue and white ribbon around the sturdy gum trees. Blue is her favourite colour. Lyndi’s friend, Lesley, from Bethlehem, helps us, and her husband drives their bakkie to each tree. As we tie them in place my thoughts reel back to the 1960s when my husband and I had been students at Helderberg College.
A fellow student from Angola had died, falling from the farm truck going down this very same hill. I wonder how his mother had felt on getting the news. Living so far away, she would not have been able to attend her boy’s funeral. How had she survived her grief? The distraction brings momentary relief, but then a sense of sadness for the whole of humanity envelopes me, a dark dark cloud. I feel as though I could easily suffocate, my life force crushed, my heart wrung dry from the tears which continue to flow down my cheeks - wetting my shirt and breasts.
Eventually, it is time to leave the house for the funeral. We want to be early enough to spend some time with Lyndi before the service. When we arrive at the church it is already filling, and we help to carry the casket with its precious cargo in from the hearse. I help take the lid off. There she lies in pure and silent beauty, her lengthy hair half-covering the satin pillow. Her eyes closed as in a deep sleep, her arms relaxed with the right hand holding the rose to her chest. She looks so restful with a slight grin playing around the corners of her mouth, as though amused at our attempts to be gracious. All I want to do is dive in there with her and pull the lid down tight, tight, tight. Dear God, how will I survive without her laughter to remind me of the humour in most things?
I kiss her forehead and stroke her hair for what seems like hours, smiling and talking to her. I experience a sense of tingling excitement which I can not explain. I do know that it keeps me from crying throughout the afternoon. It is as if there are no more tears or even a reason to shed them. She is safer now than she has ever been while we looked after her as a young child. And yet… oh how I will miss her cheerful voice, her love and consideration of our needs and care for both herself and her brother.
My husband beckons me to take a seat next to him and Ant. The time has come to close the casket and say goodbye one more time,
“Bye, my precious angel. I’ll see you in good time when we rise to meet Him in the air.” And then,
“Schleep like a babe ‘til then.” These are the words she’d use when we said goodnight. “Schleep like a babe Mooksa,” she’d say concluding our telephone call.
Lyndi in Botswana
Ian tells of the times Lyndi had joined them to build a church in Botswana or spend a weekend together. Once she had popped in en-route to borrow money for a friend, she had paid it back promptly. He suggested that violence only begets more violence and that the most appropriate Christian response to this violent death is to absorb it, just as Lyndi’s soft body has absorbed the bullets on that fateful day, four days previously. What does absorbing grief mean? As the question flashes through my mind, I dismiss it immediately with Scarlet O’Hara’s,
‘I’ll think about that tomorrow when I can stand it’.
My husband and Ant stand at the podium with arms around each other while they thank everyone for coming to honour our child and sister. My husband gives a moving life sketch – She was a little charmer from the word go… always busy making her surroundings beautiful, a happy and a better place to be. He adds a note in Afrikaans from her first teacher who has heard the news,
Ek onthou so goed daardie flikker in die bruin oogies asook die glimlag’ – vertel Petro Theron van Marquard – ‘I remember the flicker in those brown, smiling eyes so well’ tells Petro from Marquard – That’s what I will miss he continues. Ant holds his hand as he fights for control - pain written all over his face. Then it is Ants turn to thank the young ones for their presence and love that sustains us in his enormous grief. We stand around the casket, family and friends with our arms around each other. Now it’s my turn. Will my voice hold? Without a quivery voice or even a tear, in an even and controlled rhythm, it all pours out.
Gracious Father
You gave your only Son
to bring healing for every soul on earth
Thank you for our only daughter
May healing come through her death
to each person she touched - especially those who murdered her
Mary, Mother of God our children, died at the hands of evil men
Lyndi had no choice, no time
But your son said it for her:
“Father, forgive them for they do not know what they do.”
We gave her bed and board and some love
You gave her forgiveness and a love that was:
honest,
pure,
selfless,
colour and gender-free.
Dear God she taught me well of you
able to listen,
ready to hear.
That was her life that you gave her
Her death was swift and painless, thank goodness.
My heart is broken
The hole is bottomless
it will not end
But you know all about it.
Thank you for the arms,
the lips,
the heartbeats
of family and friends to carry us.
