Real Men Should Plan Their Own Mother's Funerals

I went to a funeral today. If you read my blog with any frequency, you will eventually find that this is not an uncommon occurrence in my life. I do some volunteer work and a good number of my friends are considerably older than I am. So I attend their funerals and if their spouse dies, I go too. The only thing that is sure in life is death. Forget taxes, people cheat those all the time. You can’t cheat death though… it is an inevitability.

So guess what I DIDN’T wear?!!! Not shorts, a tank top, flip flops or a fanny pack. I didn’t treat her as a tourist attraction. “Oh let’s see, we’ll hit Palm Beach, the Flagler Museum, then I’ll mosey on over to the local funeral home and do a visitation.” Blech. I know, obscure reference to Reagan's funeral. I'll move on.

This women's organization I’m in, and of which this 93 year old woman was a member of, has a chaplain. Our chaplain called the funeral home to get information and the director discreetly asked her if we would plan something for the deceased. It seemed the son was not going to. He was going to have a standard visitation, open the doors, let people file in and file out and leave. No words to be said about her, no nothing. So my chapter upon hearing the son was TOTALLY dropping the ball on this, planned her whole damn funeral. Nothing that was going to cost him, mind you, but the service, the speakers, the programs, we bought flowers, everything. So let me yell this at the top of my lungs now, “REAL MEN PLAN THEIR OWN MOTHER’S FUNERALS!” There. I feel better. I can think of only three reasons you cannot plan your own Mother’s funeral:

* You are under the age of 30. I will give you to the age of 30 to no longer be a man/boy. After that, you are a man.

* You suffer from either very low IQ or are not mentally competent

* Your mother died in a freak wood chipper accident with your entire family. (Wood chipper reference stolen from my Blog Father Grau)

Other than that, give me a damn break. She was his frickin’ MOTHER! And I knew the woman! She was a damn good person. She deserved to have a few words said over her body… which brings me to…

You have not attended a funeral until you have done so with a lot of elderly ladies. Older people are a damn riot. They do not hold back. I was standing by the coffin, which was open, Blech, and there she is, looking very dead. An 80something year old woman walks right up, looks at me and says loudly, “Yuck. Those glasses look terrible on her.” and walks away. A couple minutes later another woman, who is 94 walks up and says very loudly, “her hair looks terrible! So fierce!” Well, it did look terrible, but I sure as hell wasn’t going to SAY anything! Especially not to her son… which she did. (Her son’s reply was, “You take what you can get.”) Another woman was sitting in the pews and I heard her say loudly, “This confirms it. I’m having closed casket!”

All and all today’s experience was not a bad one. Just very enlightening…