Celebrations of life: The best last choice?
I have been to a number of celebrations of life (with probably more coming), and my take is, they are the Diet Coke of mourning rituals. Though grateful to attend each, I went home with an empty feeling. That may be because I grew up around Irish wakes, intense, deeply cathartic occasions.
When I had a beer with a minister friend, Dr. A., I told her that I felt incomplete after the last celebration, not sufficiently mourned-out. She nodded sagely; Dr. A. always nods sagely. She asked what was missing, and I said, "A frame, the ritual". There are hors d'oeuvres or an elegant lunch, touching speeches, tasteful music, a composed family who circulate: it's a brunch with boxes of Kleenex.
Several friends who left instructions for their celebrations provided a long list of invitees—and they came, along with their plus-ones. As a widowed friend said, "I am going to have ninety three-minute conversations with persons I've never met before." His feeling was of dread, not celebration. He just wanted to get it over with.
Throughout my early years, there was an inviolable sequence to the rituals of death, and each stage built on the previous: the lulling chant of the rosary at the funeral home; the Mass with its stately eulogy; and finally, the wake at the house, where intimates let down stoic facades. The food and drink comprised what our great-grandmother, known as Ma Reilly, called "a hell of a gorge".
We waked my brother at his farm, after his funeral Mass. (The old Irish tradition waked the person before the funeral, but in modern times, it happens after.) The family invited his closest friends, which included kids and dogs. His widow was held tenderly, supported in every sense. The love and grief was unconstrained by circulating servers and a time limit on the room rental.
For a day and a half, people grilled burgers, took naps, toasted Denny with his favourite cocktail (G&T), brewed tea, played piano, told stories, looked at photos. When celebrations of life include everyone from colleagues who have not seen the person in the dozen years since retirement, to oldest friends, the mix rarely evokes those stories.
I'm thinking, before charging my family to hold a celebration of life, Do I really think those saddened by my death will party down? I understand the celebration aspect is not that I died, but that I lived. Still, these events just don't feel... celebratory. I have participated in other rituals: Jewish shivas, Buddhist rites, secular funerals and a few ash-scatterings of questionable legality but deep emotion.
I like the open house format. If our own home isn't available, I'd like to sidestep a function room with my name on a sign in those little push-in letters. But what will I know?
Al's parents died a few months apart. Honouring their wishes, he spread their ashes in the river behind the pub where they had met in their twenties. Friends dropped in for a pint or coffee and sang the old songs Pete and Peggy loved. I'll always remember forty voices singing,
"I'm only a common old workin' lad
As anyone can see,
But when I get a couple o' drinks on a Saturday,
Glasgow belongs to me!"
What would be your wish?
When I had a beer with a minister friend, Dr. A., I told her that I felt incomplete after the last celebration, not sufficiently mourned-out. She nodded sagely; Dr. A. always nods sagely. She asked what was missing, and I said, "A frame, the ritual". There are hors d'oeuvres or an elegant lunch, touching speeches, tasteful music, a composed family who circulate: it's a brunch with boxes of Kleenex.
Several friends who left instructions for their celebrations provided a long list of invitees—and they came, along with their plus-ones. As a widowed friend said, "I am going to have ninety three-minute conversations with persons I've never met before." His feeling was of dread, not celebration. He just wanted to get it over with.
Throughout my early years, there was an inviolable sequence to the rituals of death, and each stage built on the previous: the lulling chant of the rosary at the funeral home; the Mass with its stately eulogy; and finally, the wake at the house, where intimates let down stoic facades. The food and drink comprised what our great-grandmother, known as Ma Reilly, called "a hell of a gorge".
We waked my brother at his farm, after his funeral Mass. (The old Irish tradition waked the person before the funeral, but in modern times, it happens after.) The family invited his closest friends, which included kids and dogs. His widow was held tenderly, supported in every sense. The love and grief was unconstrained by circulating servers and a time limit on the room rental.
For a day and a half, people grilled burgers, took naps, toasted Denny with his favourite cocktail (G&T), brewed tea, played piano, told stories, looked at photos. When celebrations of life include everyone from colleagues who have not seen the person in the dozen years since retirement, to oldest friends, the mix rarely evokes those stories.
I'm thinking, before charging my family to hold a celebration of life, Do I really think those saddened by my death will party down? I understand the celebration aspect is not that I died, but that I lived. Still, these events just don't feel... celebratory. I have participated in other rituals: Jewish shivas, Buddhist rites, secular funerals and a few ash-scatterings of questionable legality but deep emotion.
I like the open house format. If our own home isn't available, I'd like to sidestep a function room with my name on a sign in those little push-in letters. But what will I know?
Al's parents died a few months apart. Honouring their wishes, he spread their ashes in the river behind the pub where they had met in their twenties. Friends dropped in for a pint or coffee and sang the old songs Pete and Peggy loved. I'll always remember forty voices singing,
"I'm only a common old workin' lad
As anyone can see,
But when I get a couple o' drinks on a Saturday,
Glasgow belongs to me!"
What would be your wish?
Comments
The most recent wake I attended was entirely managed by was the adult children (both male and female) of the deceased. No windows cleaned.
Kamchik: I held a tea for my mother that was no work except for making a picture wall, which I enjoyed. It was held in the hotel suite where we stayed, but not in a function room. So, if felt much homier. Maybe that's what I'll ask for, I always liked good hotels.
I flew to FL to (I thought) deal with her apt. and a few banking matters. But I had not realized that her friends would be upset and very insistent that I hold an event so they "could say goodbye". I ended up having the tea described in my comment to Kamchik. And I did it their way: it was a tea with a bar.
Funerals pain me, but I do enjoy the brunch with family and friends afterwards. An architect/friend died a few years ago. He was too young and his children were way to young. At the end of the service the minister honored Stan’s one request. The organ music to be played had to be Inagaddadavida from The Simpson’s. The organist did a fine job and we all exited the church laughing. Stan always could make us laugh. I loved that service.
I've attended heartfelt Catholic and Anglican funerals, as well as Jewish ones (my Muslim friends are mostly heathens) but this friend was not religious in a denominational sense, so a religious ceremony would have been false. Same for me. I certainly don't want to prevent believing friends or relatives to lighting candles or praying for my soul, but it would be a betrayal to insert me in a religous ceremony (well, the cult of Bastet the Cat Goddess might be an exception).
Thinking of the wake makes me think of one of my oldest living relatives who is a dyed in the wool Irish Catholic but also a person as forgiving and non-judgemental as the current Pope. I don't like to think of that as she is still vivid at not far from 100, and her mum lived to 102. That Irish/Franco-Ontarian family remembers her mum every day. Her dad lived to 98 or 99.
Leslie M: Wonderful, but who played the interminable drum solo? A friend of mine, a jazz lover, got his staid congregation to allow “ When the Saints Go Marchin’ In.” What would you choose? I always thought “ In My Life” ( Beatles) would be good.
Also, he was a very renowned figure in his field, recognized throughout the world, and many many of his friends and colleagues wanted to say good-byes. We as a family didn't have to do a thing. Berkeley Nat Lab held that event in its Gardens and it was a beautiful affair with lots of talks, laughs, and memories. It was ideal for me, for our 9yo son, for our older boys as we did not cry and that was wonderful.
His ashes are here, with me in Japanese maple adorned urn. We will not do a thing with them until our youngest son is old enough for all of us to decide what to do with them.
As for me, I am fine with a very brief affair, if any and cremation. Really do not care much.
(I had a friend who was convinced he would witness his celebration of life from the beyond, but I am not convinced that happens.)
I have catered for several local funerals as a Rotary fundraiser and have served the tea and coffee at a number as a school mum to make those ever needed funds. This way yummy homemade food is eaten and the workload either spread or doing good by helping raise community funds.
For the recent funeral of my Father-in-Law, I made a dozen large egg and bacon pies to feed the family as it was his favourite food. Everyone came back to my home and everyone pitched in to make the tea and coffee, serve the champagne and help themselves to the pie and to the slices that my brother-in-law made.
I have already started My Funeral File with a list of poems, readings, hymns and music that the family can choose to include in the service, and all of my wishes in regards to a coffin, ashes, etc. That way the funeral service will reflect my life and not just be a cookie cutter version.
My husband didn’t want any ceremony, but he did want to be buried. He said medicine had enough of his body after cancer treatment. We had a simple family only burial. The rabbi was the mother of one of his trombone students. The shiva was peaceful, until everyone left and his brother screamed at my parents and me.
I held a memorial two weeks later for our children, who were 10, 10, and 13. It was punctuated by brass performances. Groups of students and former students and colleagues played. The trombones of the St. Louis Symphony, the principal Gary’s best friend, played. Everyone with an instrument played Bach at the end. It was a wonderful mix of family, friends, and students that truly invoked his spirit.
Ritual is needed in death. It connects us to the collective, and it removes the need for thought and socializing. Those who are religious have this at hand more readily than those of us who are not. You’re right, D, there’s likely a market.
Aretha Franklin “I never loved a man the way I love you” and let the boys figure out who I mean. 😉 or, Joe Cocker “With a little help from my friends”.
And, no drum solo. The only sad part of the service.
The only thing I am sure of for myself is that I want a funeral to involve as little expense as possible as I prefer knowing there is money left for the family and not a funeral home. Cremation, for sure. My family knows that much. I will leave it to them to decide what they want to do (or not do) about my passing as I won't really care and they will.
dana: Thank you for the detail and reminder that it can be classic ritual but not end well, as in the shiva. Youe care in the memorial for your children and friends reflects your love for everyone...and Bach is always good.
Mary: This was done then ( but dated). My father wanted to be laid out like that and I lived in terror of it all my childhood. It horrified me even anticipating it. But I should have known my mother would never have done it, and didn’t. You lived my worst fear.
Lily: I will channel Auntie and say, “ Then anywhere beautiful, dear.” One friend's mother wanted to parcel out her ashes likevthat, till her priest pointed out that when she rose again all the bits might not find one another.
And depending on where you live, you can’t openly dispose of ashes wherever you want, there are laws.
Sara: Funeral potatoes are new to me. But kids running around is not, however in my family they are only at the wake, not the service, until high school age.
Sting: All this time (about his dad)