Funerals Suck

[jpark]

I am 39 years old and although I am close to my Dad - after all this time I learned something new about him today - how strong he can be.

His best friend of 30 years passed rather suddenly a few days ago.  My Dad gave a very elegant and inspiring eulogy about the life of his friend.  People were quite taken by his short speech - including the priest and the family of the deceased.  It was a large funeral.

I could never do that - give the eulogy of my best friend - and maintain solid composure through the whole deal.  I am proud of my Dad today.

However, funerals really do suck.

[stray]

I couldn't do it either.

I've avoided funerals to this day actually (let alone eulogies). Never been to one (think I made a thread about this once).

Not that there hasn't been a shortage of opportunity, or that I don't care -- I do care and have had enough people I've known pass away. I can't really explain why I don't go to them though. I'd fight for someone in life, I'd be their friend, I'd even stay at their bedside all day if they're sick. But if an unfortunate thing such as death happens, I give my respects in my own way and try to move on.

I don't want to mourn or see people doing it. Naturally, I'd rather be somewhere else -- and act on that thought.

[schild]

I can't do funerals either.

[Llava]

I've been to a few funerals, including one for my best friend from grades 4 to 8.  He died in a car crash and I found out on the news.  I've never cried at a funeral, but I've never had to speak either.  Speaking I don't think I could do, but attending I can handle.

[Ironwood]

I like funerals.  It's drinking time.

[Llava]

It's different in the USA.  We generally don't have pubs right next to the cemetary.   Very little drinking happens at our funerals.

[Yegolev]

Funerals suck.

Also, when is it not drinking time in Scotland?

[Ironwood]

It's different in the USA.  We generally don't have pubs right next to the cemetary.   Very little drinking happens at our funerals.

That's horrible.  Your funerals must be sad affairs.

[Engels]

Unless you're a cop on the east coast. Then they drag out the bagpipes, of all things, and head to the cop bar.

[Llava]

It's different in the USA.  We generally don't have pubs right next to the cemetary.   Very little drinking happens at our funerals.

That's horrible.  Your funerals must be sad affairs.

Got a native Irish friend who moved back there a few years ago.  I heard his stories about his grandfather's funeral.  It was somewhat different from the funerals I've attended.  I'd imagine Scotland is roughly same in that respect.

[WayAbvPar]

If my friends and family don't have a giant pissup of a wake for me when I die, I am gonna be pissed. Even more pissed then about being dead. I want drunken people telling stories about me, both good and bad, and laughing and crying. Then they can forget I existed and get on with their lives.

[Fabricated]

Funerals always struck me as sort of a morbid and selfish thing. I don't want to get dressed up and sit 2-3 hours in a smelly funeral parlor listening to elevator music while constantly being reminded of my mortality and that so and so is dead. Yeah, I know they're dead, I don't volunteer to be miserable for a whole day thanks.

[FatuousTwat]

Thats why I'm being shot out of a cannon. Or burnt, I haven't decided.

[WayAbvPar]

Thats why I'm being shot out of a cannon. Or burnt, I haven't decided.

No reason you can't do both.

[Llava]

http://youtube.com/watch?v=6uvMFgVPOU0

[Lantyssa]

I am with Stray and Schild.  I have trouble handling funerals if I am at all close to the person.  I had to miss my best friend's because I was in no condition to make the hour drive.  It didn't even fully register for another three days.

[angry.bob]

It's the stitches through the lips and heavy make-up that always gets me. It always makes me feel that I'm paying respects to a giant doll or stuffed toy instead of a friend or relative.

[Riggswolfe]

I plan to have them play Staying Alive at my funeral. None of this serious shit. I want to be cremated and am hoping I can work out a deal where my corpse just bursts into flame unexpectedly at the funeral. Considering the way I live I better start my planning ASAP.

BTW JPark, you have every reason to be proud of your dad it sounds like.

[Mr_PeaCH]

Two funeral eulogy stories that come to mind.

First being for my paternal Grandfather.  It was to be a simple small service with just the family and a few friends.  We had it 'graveside' (as opposed to a chapel) which always strikes me as a little odd but anyways.  Granny was always a church-going Lutheran but Granddad only ever went once in a great while to humor her.  Granny had her minister come and say a few words.  I believe a number of the 'friends' were friends of Granny's rather than Granddads and members of the church.  After the minister had done his bit, all very generically pious, my Uncle Steve got up and basically brushed aside the Minister as being well-intentioned but someone who obviously did not know his father.  Thus began the 'real' eulogy.  I was of college age at the time and I thought it was just awesome how my uncle turned the ceremony on its head and 'did the right thing'.  Afterwards even Granny said she was glad Steve stepped up and injected some of her deceased husband's (considerable) personality into the affair.

The other story involved my paternal Grandmother's funeral at the same cemetary some years later.  This time the proceedings were ambushed by my cousin, Laura, the militant feminist lesbian.  She used the occasion to inform us that our dear, dead Granny's life had been unfulfilled because she stopped working after she married Granddad and lived the hard, lonely life of a housewife and homemaker.  She held up our Granny's life as an example of all the things wrong with our male-dominated society essentially.  Needless to say nobody saw this coming and it was hard to say where she was going with this rant; I think she just had a few things to get off her chest.  I am sure that I have never quite forgiven her for tarnishing the memory of my dear old Gran.

Anyways, yeah, funerals are hard.  It's cool that you got to see that side of your dad.

[Ironwood]

Funerals always struck me as sort of a morbid and selfish thing. I don't want to get dressed up and sit 2-3 hours in a smelly funeral parlor listening to elevator music while constantly being reminded of my mortality and that so and so is dead. Yeah, I know they're dead, I don't volunteer to be miserable for a whole day thanks.

These cultural differences are shocking to me.  That's not a funeral.  That's a fucking chore.

[Oban]

Clearly US funerals need more http://forums.f13.net/index.php?topic=8027.0...

[Xanthippe]

I enjoy my family's funerals, as much as one can enjoy a funeral.  There's a service, then a gathering afterward to remember the deceased with food and drink, which resembles a party more than a funeral. 

My cousin's husband died at age 32 of melanoma, leaving a wife, a newborn and a 2 year old, after about a year long illness.  He planned the party after the funeral with my uncle - from food to drink to music.  It was a very nice gathering.  There was a bit of drama, because his mother was upset to see people enjoying himself - despite being told that those were his wishes.  She never forgave my cousin or my uncle.

I don't understand that attitude at all.  I'd so much rather people hoist one to me and remember having fun with me than cry and carry on.  Life is difficult enough.

[Tale]

These cultural differences are shocking to me.  That's not a funeral.  That's a fucking chore.

Cultural background to Scottish funerals, at least as a distributor of bad whisky sees it:

All life's milestones, from cradle to grave, were celebrated in whisky. A dram was provided for midwives at births, for christening and betrothal feasts and at every wedding. A glass of Scotch would be raised to celebrate the building of a new home or the safe arrival home of fishing boats.

'The greatest occasion of all was - and indeed still is - the Scottish funeral,' adds Hector. 'The spirit of the departed was believed to linger through hospitality between relatives and friends.

'"For God's sake, give them a hearty drink" were the last words of a dying Highland laird to his son. It was considered an insult to the dead if funeral guests were not given an abundance of whisky. It was not surprising that English officers who witnessed such occasions pronounced a Scottish funeral to be merrier than an English wedding.'

With the extended families embraced by the clan system, it would be considered something of an insult if less than 800 litres were consumed at a big funeral, Hector adds. These occasions could go on for several days and were often quite spectacular.

'The hospitality dispensed by a well-known clan chief, Forbes of Culloden, at his mother's funeral was lavish. The funeral procession took place at night with flaming torches and bagpipes - a wonderful sight. However, when the mourners finally arrived at the grave, they found the corpse had been left behind. But then, Forbes of Culloden owned his own distillery!'

Scottish hospitality is legendary. As early as 1498, the Spanish Ambassador to Scotland reported home that, 'The Scots like foreigners so much that they dispute with one another as to who shall have and treat the foreigner in his house - nothing in Scotland is scarce, but money.'

Source (LOL): http://www.suntory.co.jp/whisky/Ballantine/chp-02-e.html

When my uncle, a famous lawyer who fell into alcoholism, died in Edinburgh last year, there was a huge funeral. Afterwards, everyone in attendance was invited to a pub that used to kick him out.

[Signe]

My sister went to a New Orleans funeral some years ago.  She didn't really know the person very well and she had a wonderful time.  On the other hand, most of the funerals I've gone to were on my mother's side, my mother included.  Italian and horrible.  Horrible, horrible, horrible.  The Norwegian side however, likes the sort of funeral no one is invited to... also, my favourite kind.

[Fabricated]

Funerals always struck me as sort of a morbid and selfish thing. I don't want to get dressed up and sit 2-3 hours in a smelly funeral parlor listening to elevator music while constantly being reminded of my mortality and that so and so is dead. Yeah, I know they're dead, I don't volunteer to be miserable for a whole day thanks.

These cultural differences are shocking to me.  That's not a funeral.  That's a fucking chore.

Your average American funeral consists of sitting in a smelly funeral parlor decorated in what looks like 1920 deco style, filing past a propped up and painted corpse, the people who get emotional get emotional, those who don't are either bored or uncomfortable and make the most brainrending small-talk to pass the time until the actual funeral. Most friends and distant family leave after the showing, and then the procession goes to the gravesite, the preacher quotes the bible, 2-3 people tops give speeches which are basically telling you why you should be more miserably sad. Then they put the body in the ground and you go to eat shitty catered food at someone's house or rented venue. Then you go home and obsess over your own inevitable death for an unhealthy amount of time.

American as apple pie and baseball.

[schild]

I knew there was a reason I didn't like apple pie and baseball.

[Llava]

Thankfully, my family is full of smartasses.  So we haven't really had anyone break down and get emotional, and the small talk consist of jokes at the deceased's expense.

For instance, when my great grandmother passed, I walked by the casket and did this, "Goodbye, Grandma.  I SAID GOODBYE! GRANDMA!  NO, GOOD!  BYE!"

Of course I wasn't screaming loud enough to alert the whole room, but the nearby family members chuckled.

[Ironwood]

My mother wishes her body to be carried down the aisle to the tune of 'The Stripper' and that her headstone be an enormous black Marble Dung beetle, to represent what she's done with her life.  She also wants no-one over 14 to walk out of the after party sober.

Make no mistake, I have the money and respect that her wishes will be carried out.

Seriously.

[angry.bob]

and that her headstone be an enormous black Marble Dung beetle, to represent what she's done with her life.

Holy shit, I'm stealing that for for my own headstone. Not her own actual Marble Dung Beetle, the idea.

[jpark]

Funerals always struck me as sort of a morbid and selfish thing. I don't want to get dressed up and sit 2-3 hours in a smelly funeral parlor listening to elevator music while constantly being reminded of my mortality and that so and so is dead. Yeah, I know they're dead, I don't volunteer to be miserable for a whole day thanks.

I think there is a critical error here:  we attend funerals not so much to celebrate the life of the deceased - but to provide support for those most affected by the passing - parents, children etc.

It's really important to keep in mind when you show up at a funeral - you're providing support to the spouse/father etc. etc. impacted by the whole affair.

[Signe]

Since this topic is so nice and dark, I thought it would be a great place to wish Rasix:



Bend over, Sunshine.

[Engels]

My step-uncle's dad was a funeral director, so all the kids in his family grew up around the hideous pomposity in the funeral parlor. When their own mother died, the three brothers wanted to put a little speaker at the head of the casket connected via infrared to a microphone to have mom send messages from beyond while the parson warbled on about stuff. "She was well loved by.." "Oh that's bullshit, you all are glad I'm dead!" type of stuff.

Unfortunately, more sober heads prevailed.

[Bunk]

I have to say that I agree with jpark. I show up to funerals to support the family.

I know personally that when my Grandfather died a few years ago - we were very close and he died well before he should have - that the turnout for his funeral was a very big deal to me. The reminder that more people loved the man than would fit in to that little chapel was uplifting.

So, I go to funerals for the sake of the family. I don't enjoy them by any means, but I still go. I do wish we were a little more in to the whole wake thing around here though.

[Kenrick]

My granddad died on Sunday.  Tonight was a private family memorial/viewing and tomorrow morning is the funeral.  I'd never seen a dead body before tonight believe it or not...  Didn't really look like him for some reason.  Dunno.  Funerals do suck though.

But I will say this, though... he had a "good death."  We'd known for about a week that he was probably in his last days.  When he finally died, all five of his daughters plus his wife of 68 years were by his side.  They were singing hymns to him and he was looking at my grandma and told her he loved her, and that they'd had a great, fun life.  Then his eyes dialated and he was gone.  Bless her heart... she is holding up so well.  Nearly seventy years they'd gone to sleep together nearly every night... that's an amount of time that I can't even wrap my head around.

Guess I better go get my beauty sleep.  I'll be pallbeariing in the morning.

http://obit.wcfish.com/obit_display.cgi?id=340270&listing=Current

[Signe]

Condolences, Kenrick.