It was August 2009 when my father and “the kids”—my two sisters, my brother, and I—were sitting at Mum’s bedside on the 19th floor of Mass General Hospital, in the thoracic ward, watching her closely and awaiting the latest word from her surgical and oncological team. On September 23, in the wee hours of the morning, she died.

The last words I remember her speaking were, “We’re off and away!”… And so we were! A year later, aboard our home away from home for the past three years, our 43’ cutter "Bahati," my wife Betsy and I are sailing past the island of Sumba in Indonesia on our way to Bali. I talk with my Dad by satellite phone and he tells me, in a voice strong with pride and satisfaction, about “Bringing your mother back to the Island.”

I think, So, he’s finally decided to move her ashes …from the mantelpiece in the living room where he has lovingly been keeping them, placing flowers next to the simple faux wood urn daily and talking to her there in the evenings, or whenever he has something particular on his mind to work out.

“I ask people to get flowers from the Island or the garden and bring them in for her.”

But, no, he is not moving her ashes, not yet! A while ago, he had picked out a large stone from the old farmhouse foundation on Oak Tree Point on Yarmouth Island. He had had it carefully moved to the mainland, where he had it inscribed, in black lettering etched across its rough face:

Our beloved Molly

Marian Morton White

He’s telling me now how he and my brother Ben and Ben’s friend Lynn, who owns a panel truck equipped with a hydraulic tailgate and a small crane on the back, picked up the stone and drove it to Bethel Point, where they muscled it onto the bow of the flat-bottomed Carolina skiff and transported it at high tide back across to the Island and up into the cove. Back to the Island home where it started… but decorated now and destined for a new site! They managed to roll it onto a small cart, and with Ben pulling and Lynn pushing, the big rock finds its way up the meadow, across the fragile cedar-boughed bridge at the creek, and under the twin cedar trees next to Aunt Helen’s stone, not far from the stones marking the burial places of two of our old dogs, Tubby and Chebeague.

As I hear my father telling the satisfying end of this stone saga, I am also in the midst of reading about the rituals that accompany burials on the Indonesian islands we are slowly sailing past. The Lonely Planet guide explains:

Funerals may be delayed for several years until enough wealth has been accumulated for a second burial accompanied by the erection of a massive stone-slab tomb. In some cases the dragging of the tombstone from outside the village is an important part of the procedure. Sometimes, hundreds are needed to move the block of stone and the family of the deceased feed them all. A ratu (priest) sings for the pullers, which is answered in chorus by the group. The song functions as an invocation to the stone.

I guess my father and brother and Lynn didn’t sing to my mother’s stone, but I bet they did some powerful whistling as they went about their hard work!

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Then there’s the other stone—the one that now sits on Mum and Dad’s ‘plot’ at the cemetery on Pine Street, less than a mile from the house they lived in together for more than 60 years…

The day of my mother’s memorial service, October 4, 2008, Dad decides it’s time to do something about their tombstone. Not just hers, but the one they will share. He’s been thinking about it for months.

“I’ve got an idea!” he tells us all. “You know that granite stone covering the well in the backyard? The one that came from the foundation of this house?”

We nod together…though none of us know its history like he does.

“Well, I think that would make a perfect stone for our grave. Your mother would like that. I’d like the engraver to come look at it and tell me what he thinks. Why don’t we move it to the front yard while you boys are all here to help, ok?”

We all agree. After all, it’s his day… well, her day to be more precise! And yet we are all wondering the same thing: Why move it to the front yard when the ’engraver’ can just as easily come look at it in the backyard where it lies? It must weigh over 1000 lbs by the look of it—not an easy thing to move under any circumstances! And the front yard is uphill from the back!

Dad has instructed my son Josh and his cousin Asher in the technique of splitting the stone in two using a star drill and a sledgehammer. But after several hours of pounding away they’ve managed to drill a hole less than 18” deep, so they give up the effort declaring it will probably take them weeks to accomplish the task.

So, all we men—me, Josh, Asher, my brother Ben, my cousin Neil and brother-in-law Jim, my cousin Margo’s husband Larry, and Dad—head for the backyard where the large granite stone sits next to the spot where the giant elm tree stood overlooking the sandbox we all played in as kids. The elm died years ago—only a big stump is left to mark the spot. The stone covers the well where Dad and Mum drew water before the town system was created. We all stand around next to the elm stump and examine the stone closely without saying anything.

“Maybe we should get a piece of strong rope, the braided one I keep in your mother’s car for towing, and that snow scoop from the garage,” suggests Dad.

“OK!” we speak as one and Jim goes to fetch them. When he returns Asher ties the rope around the stone and we line up the wooden creaky snow scoop in front of it.

“OK! Pull, boys!” Dad commands.

We pull. We push. We huff. We puff. We heave and try to scrunch the scoop under the front edge of the stone, but we can barely tip the giant rock, much less move it, even a few inches. When the weight of its edge lands on the scoop, the scoop creaks and bends like it’s going to die.

“OK! What’s next?” asks Jim, ever the encouraging “outlaw.” He wants to please—we all do. It’s a special day and Dad should be able to have things his way.

Brother Ben and Cousin Neil, both artists (one a painter and sculptor, the other a photographer) have disappeared to get lobsters from Dad’s car down on the wharf, I think, or at least do something ’more useful’—and logical. They only appear again as the job is being completed—and are complimented by the rest of us on their good timing.

“How heavy do you think it is, Grampa?” asks Josh, the ever-skeptical political activist.

“Hard to tell… But you guys are rugged!” Dad declares. He’s an engineer by trade.

“I don’t think we’re gonna budge it with the rope and scoop method,” I suggest. I’m an actor, and basically lazy. “We gotta try something more radical!”

“Like what?” asks Jim, the lawyer.

“How about we just tip it over, end for end?!” Asher, the contractor, pipes in.

“Wow! Why not? Sure worth a try!” we all decide at once.

“Whatever you boys think!” Dad’s smiling now. He’s got us on the move.

We get our hands under the back end of the rock and, on the count of three, we heave her up. She slowly rises. When she’s standing on her end, Josh, the community organizer, shouts:

“Get out of the way!”

We do. The rock falls down on its topside. The earth literally shakes under our feet.

“Good work, boys!” Dad’s excited.

We’ve got a method now—a process. We simply repeat it over and over and over, up the hill, around the side of the house, until we reach the edge of the driveway. Then, sweating, panting, proud of ourselves, relieved no one has been killed, we turn to Dad and he says, “Good! That oughta do it, boys! For now….! How about a drink to celebrate?”

We all traipse into the kitchen and collapse, laughing and cursing the damned thing but feeling good about our work.

“Must weigh at least a ton!” Asher almost shouts, sipping his beer.

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Two months later, I am home again and Dad asks me if I want to see “the stone."

“Sure!” I say, and I mean it. It has become an icon. It’s as weighty as their 61 years of marriage—63 years of owning the old house together.

We climb into Dad’s pickup and drive up Pine Street to the graveyard. It’s cold now. There’s snow on the ground. We leave the truck by the side of the road and walk to the back row of stones, which line up along the edge of the woods. The sun is setting behind us and the light on the trees is deep orange and sharp-etched like the letters engraved in the stone:

WHITE

John William Loud

1923 -        

Marian “Molly” Morton

1925 - 2008

“There’s room enough for any of the rest of you who want to join us,” says Dad quietly. “Whadya think? The angle isn’t quite right yet… I want to tip it up a little more… There are mayflowers growing behind it under the trees. Your mother loves mayflowers.”

“I think it’s perfect, Dad,” I tell him and I mean it—it really looks great.

“Good. I think your mother would like it too. It came from the foundation of our house. The engraver cut it in half and I put the other half on the step by the front door to even things out a bit.”

“I know, I saw it there… Seems a little tippy.”

“Yeah…. Needs a shim or two… Should be fine, though. Your mother approved!”

He likes to say that these days. In fact, he runs most things past her in the ’front room.’ He goes in there to talk to her every evening before bed. I’ve heard him. It was always important that she approve. And she usually does, if only to please him. “Whatever your mother wants, she gets!” he liked to say. “I think she willed the end—decided to stop eating… She’d had enough… And she knew you and Betsy were getting ready to leave again.”

“She was so tired, Dad. She didn’t have the strength to keep going anymore. I don’t think she could eat at the end. She tried but it was so hard for her to swallow, and nothing tasted good. She was done. And you know, we were ready to stay ‘til the end, regardless. I think she knew that too.”

He doesn’t say anything. We stand there as the last glow of dusk fades behind us and the letters on the rock get harder to read.

“Well…” he finally says. “It’s a good spot. I wanted it to be ready when I go… just to know it’s here waiting. The letters came out just the way I wanted them to. I think your mother would approve.”

“Me too, Dad,” I tell him, and we walk slowly through the snow back to the truck and drive home.

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Now, today, as I sail down the southern shore of Sumba, I wonder if Napa, the Muslim friend I have just met during Ramadan on the island of Kupang, who tells me he also lost his mother this year, ever had this kind of talk with his father. Napa’s a sweet guy—not so physically strong, but I sense his spirit runs deep, like my Dad’s. I think—I’m sure—Napa and his brothers would’ve found a way to move a stone like our Yarmouth Island stone—if his father asked him to. I wish I could have seen his mother’s stone. I wonder how big it is and what happened when she died...

For a few moments, as we sit in silence in front of Napa's home sipping Indonesian tea after sunset, I feel very close to him—grateful for his presence. When we leave Kupang he waves from his dugout canoe and shouts: “Goodbye, Brother... Good sailing!”