His ashes and my emotions were heavy as I carried the box to my car. It seemed somehow disrespectful, but the most secure place to put the ashes was in the hatch. I was driving and no one wanted to hold them.

We sat and buckled. I took a deep breath; all the energy had left my body. The laughter and joy of three siblings reminiscing together became three serious sixty somethings looking at death certificates. Quietness filled the small car as the air conditioner pumped cool air into the summery October morning.

Moments like this must be why they invented the word surreal. When we got back to the apartment Dad and my sister had shared, the silence from the three of us, siblings of a volume, remained palpable. As I looked inside the box of Dad, vivid and disturbing images of the last several weeks flashed in my mind. He was so much more to us than the moon dust in that box.

I placed the heavy floral-covered box in the top of his closet while my siblings sat in the shadowy living room. Like the car trunk, the closet seemed the most secure.

Later that evening, as I lay to sleep in his bed, I was keenly aware of the presence of the ashes in the closet. Like an old painting with eyes that follow I knew where they were with an ethereal sense. I feared I would not sleep but emotional exhaustion overcame the pull of ashes.

In the second creation story in Genesis, God forms the human from dust and “breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being” (Genesis 2:7 NRSVUE). The imagery continues in the third chapter in which the biblical author reminds us that we are formed from dust and will return to dust.

The ashes in the closet are not Dad. I suspect not all of his divine energy has yet separated from his earthly vessel, which is what I sense in the room with me. None of us know for certain the mystery of the end of life. I find comfort in remembering that Dad’s essence, the breath that gave his dust life lives in my DNA and that of my children and grandchildren. His essence remains in us and in those he touched with his kindness, humor, and gifts.

We will return his ashes to the earth later this month in a private family gathering. We will leave charged with living lives of goodness until our own bodies return to dust.