All your ghosts are welcome

Nearly every year since 1995 my son and daughter-in-law have hosted a gathering they call "The J. Peter Adler Memorial Wake and Weenie Roast."

J. Peter, a college friend of theirs, was killed in a traffic accident two hours after submitting his thesis for a master's in theater. Only a few of the college friends were able to attend his memorial service. Later that summer, my son organized the first "Wake and Weenie Roast," for San Francisco friends who had not been to the East Coast memorial.

When my son and his wife moved to Seattle, the Weenie Roast came too. Now the gathering consists mostly of people who never met J. Peter, but who are happy to gather in his memory and bring their own ghosts to remember and celebrate.

A proper wake offers good food, good drink, and good talk. When so many at the gathering are theater people, the talk is even better. J. Peter's mother and step-father, who live on the East Coast, provide good Scotch (J. Peter's favorite libation) and always call sometime during the party.

And the ghosts come out to dance. Tonight we toasted a grandmother who taught her grandson to laugh; high school friends who died twenty, thirty or fifty years ago; a friend who flirted with the EMTs in the ambulance carrying her to what turned out to be her last hospital visit.

We also celebrated Bucky, a four-point point buck mortally injured in a Vashon Island road accident. On a night of pouring rain, three people who had never before field-dressed an animal helped to send Bucky humanely on his way, then, after hanging the body under a deck, successfully gutted, skinned and butchered him.

A minister described a memorial service for John, a parishoner who died after many years of living with HIV. Because he had overseen church flowers and decor, he left specific instructions about flowers for the service, and asked a friend to make sure a favorite piece of red silk was used in a certain part of the church.

Although it wasn't strictly necessary, both ministers decided to wear their robes and red stoles. But when all four pallbearers, the reader and the communion assistant turned up in outfits accented with red, John's favorite color, the minister telling the story said, "I knew he was there, coordinating everything."

It was a Day of the Dead celebration, with food and drink and tears and laughter. I look forward to it every year, and cherish the people (and the ghosts) that I meet.