End of a Cold Warrior

Harry's ashes sat in a box on my cousin's mantel for six months after his death. Finally, my cousin's husband said it was time to scatter them. Harry wanted his ashes in the Pacific, preferably under the blue waves of Trestles in San Onofre, site of his high school surf sessions before joining the Army. This feat proved to be too much for the funerary budget. Instead we hired a boat in San Pedro and scattered Harry's ashes about a league beyond the breakwater. For the first time I saw the Los Angeles lighthouse, built in 1913.

I was surprised when the sea captain lowered the ashes overboard in a special bucket draped with bright flowers. At first, I thought he'd send the bucket adrift, like a tiny funeral barge. When he pulled a tethered cord, the bucket flipped over and dumped Harry's ashes into the green water. The ashes seemed to be fine white sand from some faraway beach. We cast red carnations in the air and watched them paratroop over the watery grave. We circled twice and rang the ship's bell eight times. I couldn't help but wonder if there was something more I could have done, back when the struggle for life was still being fought. Harry reminds me of the latter day Ulysses in Tennyson's poem, restless with old age, and longing for a final mission.

We are not now that strength which in the old days
Moved earth and heaven; that which we are, we are,
One equal-temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.