- I hadn't seen the Old Billionaire for awhile, so when
he called and offered Gwen the Beautiful and me a free trip I jumped at
the chance.
-
- Not only would we be hanging with him and his wife, Nettie,
and getting the latest on what life is like for the super-rich, we also
would be learning what the end of life was like for that same crowd.
-
- Yes, that's right. The trip was to a funeral. The Old
Billionaire's 76 year old younger sister had died, and we took his private
jet to Washington State, where she'd lived, loved, and raised her family
on a 1500 acre apple farm.
-
- "I thought Jilly was crazy to go all the way up
to Washington to do the same thing she could've done down here," the
Old Billionaire said as the Gulfstream climbed to its cruising altitude.
"But they raise a wider variety of crops there. And she loved being
called 'Jilly Appleseed.'"
-
- "He staked them, you know," Nettie said, nudging
the Old Billionaire's arm. "Set up the whole place."
-
- "Only the modernization. All those pipes for all
that irrigation we don't do around here-"
-
- He broke off. Nettie's eyes were welling with tears.
"I loved Jilly Appleseed," said Nettie. "We talked almost
everyday."
-
- More tears. The Old Billionaire sat awkwardly. For the
first time I saw him as a man who didn't know quite what to do.
-
- Gwen unfastened her seatbelt. Came over to Nettie. Put
her arms around her. Neither she nor Nettie said a word. My impulse would've
been to console the crying woman by talking. Saying a thousand things she
didn't need to hear.
- The Old Billionaire was ahead of me. He knew enough to
keep quiet.
-
- The rest of the flight alternated between memories and
tears and plans and laughter. Throughout it, the Old Billionaire's face
showed how much he cared about his wife's feelings. But it revealed nothing
of his own.
-
- We landed in Seattle, and I sat beside the Old Billionaire
as he drove us toward the Cascade Mountains in a rented Town Car. "The
office wanted to get me a limo," he said. "I told 'em fine, long
as the driver was comfortable riding in back while I took the wheel. That
was the end of that."
-
- So much for sharing the life of the super-rich.
-
- The funeral also was about as far from super-rich as
anything could be.
- Both the service and the burial took place in a church
cemetery in the small town that was the closest vestige of civilization
to the farm where Jilly and her husband, who'd died a few years earlier,
had lived, and where their two grown daughters - and their husbands and
children and children's children lived now, in houses that shared the property.
-
- The minister was a family friend. He knew everything
there was to know about Jilly and spoke simply and honestly about her charity
and friendship. So simply and honestly that Gwen joined Nettie in cryingand
I was tempted myself.
-
- Not so the Old Billionaire. He was a rock.
-
- Afterwards, the wake was at the American Legion Hall.
There, the so-eloquent minister took off his black suit coat and donned
an apron to tend bar while friends and family shared thoughts, feelings,
and various beverages that, judging from their reactions, were well worth
imbibing.
-
- Except for the Old Billionaire. He sat looking out the
window, watching the sprinklers that sprayed an apple orchard below the
Hall.
-
- As afternoon turned to evening, Jilly's sons-in-law and
grandsons took turns toasting everything and everyone they could think
of, and their speeches grew wilder and woollier by the glass.
-
- Until the Old Billionaire stood up and held out his diet
soda. "To my sister, resting in peace on this land."
-
- "To your sister!" everyone responded.
-
- The Old Billionaire glanced back out the window, then
returned his gaze to the assemblage.
-
- "And to the land!" he continued. "To the
irrigated land!"
-
- "To the irrigated land!" The response was a
joyous roar. Heads went back. Drinks went down. Followed by laughter, and
a generally delighted thumping of the Old Billionaire's back.
-
- The Old Billionaire smiled. Like a child, he licked the
tear that fell from his eye, catching it just before it reached his lip.
-
-
- Copyright C 2007 by Larry Brody. All rights reserved.
-
- Author Larry Brody's weekly column, LIVE! FROM PARADISE!
appears on his website, www.larrybrody.com. He has written thousands of
hours of network television, and is the author of "Television Writing
from the Inside Out" and "Turning Points in Television."
Brody is Creative Director of The Cloud Creek Institute for the Arts, the
world's first in-residence media colony. More about his activities can
be seen on www.tvwriter.com and www.cloudcreek.org. He welcomes your comments
and feedback at <mailto:LarryBrody@cloudcreek.org>LarryBrody@cloudcreek.org.
Brody, his wife and their dogs, cats, horses and chickens live in Marion
County, Arkansas. The other residents of the mythical town of Paradise
reside in his imagination.
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