Column | Carla – NRC

My father-in-law called that Carla, his lover, would die today or tomorrow. I was very calm.

We decided not to tell our children until the time came. I took them to school and then walked around town. It was raining like it had been raining for a month. I was dripping. I stopped for a box of umbrellas at a souvenir shop and picked up one with a zebra print. In the store I involuntarily started looking for some more odds and ends. I found three large, twisted shells. Maybe then I could say that Grandma Carla would hear them if they whispered something.

I paid. Behind the cash register stood a man with a gray pointed beard. He suddenly leaned over the counter in solidarity. “I have been very sick,” he said. “And then you learn what is more important in life.” I nodded, whatever. “I am 75,” he said. “And it’s enough with this.” He pointed around. Carla turned 75 tomorrow. All her life she didn’t know that she was someone who would eventually die on her birthday.

I stayed calm.

“Twenty percent discount on everything, says it all,” the man shouted after me.

I went to pick up Cheese. The classroom was dark, but the kindergarteners’ St. Martin lanterns glowed softly. They snottily sang their songs to us, the parents in the back. The sweet teacher gave the measure unperturbed. They don’t make teachers like that anymore, Carla was one too. I thought about how Carla’s balanced clarity made our children cuddle up to her like cuddly cats. How they did put their shoes on when she asked.

Very calm.

Cheese and I walked through the rain, he under my zebra umbrella, I slowly soaking wet again. We went into the cathedral and lit a candle. “For grandma Carla,” I said tamely. “Certainly for grandma Carla,” said Kaas enthusiastically. His first major death. Scandalously early, four years old and already three of Kassie’s late grandparents.

Calm.

The next day she died. We told the children. Ezra wrapped himself in a curtain and sat there for half an hour. I placed one of the shells next to him, without a story.

I stayed calm.

In the evening in Den Bosch, at Willem’s father’s house, nieces and an aunt sat at the kitchen table, in a pool of light. The men were sent away to get fries, while we tried to find addresses, photos, and grip. I love so much women who are able to form a soft wall around death together. On the wall a photo of little Carla. A beautiful girl, she thought she looked like Cléo. I agree.

Stay calm.

The movers arrived two days later. They lifted everything into our rooms. I picked up a box. ‘Crockery FRAGILE’ it said. Carla was so excited about our new house. She was so happy with Willem’s father. With us. That whole bunch that was thrown into her lap thirteen years ago and that she deserved so much.

I calmly put the box in the kitchen.

We were just waving goodbye to the movers when the postman came around the corner. He handed me a letter in our names. “How nice,” I said.

It turned out to be her funeral card.

I still didn’t break a plate, but really only because the handwriting on the crockery box was hers.

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