Na Zdrowie

I really hope I got that right. It's Polish, and it means "to your health."

Erik used to say it every time he took a shot. Today, we said our final goodbyes to him at his funeral. From now on, it'll just be visiting where he rests.

He always told us he wanted his funeral to be a huge party. Anne said he once told her he wanted clowns at his funeral. She begged him not to do that, and I think I speak for everyone when I say I'm glad he listened to her.

But funerals aren't for those who've passed. They're for those who remain to grieve, to console and to begin the healing process. Before Thursday night at his wake, it just seemed like words.

"Erik passed away."

It wasn't reality. I could hardly believe the words as they come out of my mouth when I told Anne. It was something, some nightmare, happening somewhere else, in another life, to someone else. Just words. Horrible words we feared would come ever since his diagnosis, but still just words.

But walking into the funeral home, seeing tearful family members, seeing pictures of Erik when he was young and, of course, seeing him resting in the front of the room -- it's a stomach punch that brings you back to reality.

Oh that's right. It's not just words. "Erik passed away" is more than just a few letters making up a few words I know. It's real. He's in there. Well, he's not in there. And that's really the point.

The part that made Erik Erik -- that part is gone. The body is just a shell.

Jimmy V said "Cancer can take away all my physical abilities. It cannot touch my mind, it cannot touch my heart and it cannot touch my soul. And those three things are going to carry on forever."

Erik's soul will never die. Every time any of us who loved him do anything that reminds us of him -- that's how he lives on. The part that made Erik the person we loved was not lying in the casket in Goldsboro. That was a shell -- a shell that grew too weak to contain the force of nature that was the Erik we knew.

That's why funerals are important for those of us left behind. It marks the beginning of the end of the tears. It's the last goodbye. From now on, we'll never have to go say goodbye to Erik. We'll just go visit him where he now rests. From now on, the tears will fade more and more every day, as impossible as that may seem now. From now on, the laughter and happiness he brought will come to the forefront more quickly and last much longer.

We started that tonight. Erik always said he wanted this day to be a big party, so a few of us gathered together to go to East Village on Hillsborough Street. If you're friends with Erik and have spent any time in the Raleigh area, you probably have one or two hundred memories of him at EV.

The healing process begins now. Every day will get a little easier to get through. We won't miss him any less. But we'll be somber a little less. We won't love him any less. But we'll be sorrowful a little less.

We did our best to do kick off this next phase of our lives with Erik. I ordered a couple Jack-and-Cokes -- just as he would have done -- and we all had a round of shots. We lifted our glasses to our dear friend who left us much too soon, and we said the words he so very often said himself.

Na Zdrowie.