When my time comes...

I hope people laugh.


My Mother in law had a heart attack on Dec 5th and hung on till the afternoon of Dec 7th.

She was that Grandma who was never too busy to color, fingerpaint or bake cookies. She loved kids.

There was a day or so of grief and tears and after that, there was laughter. She didn't want anyone to make a fuss over her death, she always said "Just cremate me" "I don't want people to stand around staring at me in a coffin, saying how good I look". " I'm dead and dead people don't look good". We all gathered at their house on the Saturday after her death, helping to go through paperwork, insurance policies and getting in touch with a crematorium. We told "remember that time she..." stories and spent the day laughing our asses off.

We had a Celebration of Life on Thursday December 14th. Her birthday. People from all over the state and county showed up. She had touched many lives in her time and they all came to say goodbye.

We told "JoAnn stories" and laughed some more.

That's the way I want to be remembered. Cry if you must, but make damn sure you laugh too.. Tell stories about something stupid I did or said and leave your grief behind.

Just have a good laugh.

a reply to: DAVID64

I concur.

A friend of mine died young in a car crash recently, and at his funeral, I told a story about how we once found out the wall of his apartment was filled with old raunchy porno magazines.

Then, before the eulogy we went to the parking lot and slammed a few beers and the other guys had stories about metal shows they'd gone to with him.


I want the same thing. I joke that when I die, you should summon me with absinthe and Marlboro Smooths and I'll tell dirty jokes through the spirit box.

Death is just going to the other side. In a way it's completing the game.

a reply to: DAVID64

I'm so sorry she didn't make it, David... my sincerest condolences.

Her last wishes are a testament to who she was and they should be respected. Often laughter can mask despair... if the good memories bring smiles, then she was a good person in life and will now look over her loved ones from a higher realm.

I am not sure if "Celebration of life" parties came about because funerals have gotten so expensive, or what. But we should have been doing these all along.

Yes, it is sad, that the person will no longer be with us. And that is hard. But what a fitting tribute to someone you care about, laughing and celebrating a life well lived.
Hubby and I have already told the family that is what we want.

I'm sorry about your mother in law. But what a great way to honor her.

originally posted by: DAVID64
I hope people laugh.


My Mother in law had a heart attack on Dec 5th and hung on till the afternoon of Dec 7th.

She was that Grandma who was never too busy to color, fingerpaint or bake cookies. She loved kids.

There was a day or so of grief and tears and after that, there was laughter. She didn't want anyone to make a fuss over her death, she always said "Just cremate me" "I don't want people to stand around staring at me in a coffin, saying how good I look". " I'm dead and dead people don't look good".
Just have a good laugh.

My condolences for your loss. It sounds like she was a down-to-earth person and would have been nice to be around.

Her comment on dead people not looking good reminds me of the first time I went to a funeral. I think I must have been 5 or 6. And it was a neighbor across the street, still remember his name, Art Martinez. My mom and dad would always pick up his wife and take her to the Kingdom Hall with us when we went to our meetings. He was always sitting on the front porch. He always greeted politely was always smoking. I don't remember much else, but probably not much else to remember. And still a lot for being a memory from when i was so young. But I just remember looking at his face in the casket. And just thinking how horrible it looked being dead. And then I cried because I felt sad for his wife, Phyllis. Afterward when we brought her home from the meetings she would always have my older brothers get out of the car and go inside with her and check that her home was safe. (We grew up in the middle of downtown Denver, in an area of high crime).

I tend to agree with her. Dead people don't look good. Good as reason as any to be cremated.

I experienced my first death of someone close right after my 18th birthday and was totally unprepared for all the things that go along with planning and attending a funeral. It can bring out the beauty in peoples' souls, and it can also bring out the ugly.

I began to take note of the way different cultures handle death, and it's only the western world that makes a huge, sad expensive profuction of it. No wonder there is such a fear of death, especially among the older generation who were raised in churches full of hellfire and damnation.

Other cultures see death as passing from one realm to another and celebrate it as lifes' greatest achievement. I imagine it as kind of like seeing your child graduate and move on to a life of their own; it's cause for great celebration even though there's a touch of sadness.

I think the shyrocketing cost of funerals forced a change in the way we deal with death and it's taken a lot of the morbidity out of paying our last respects.

I am at a loss as to what I want for my "send off". Either a simple cremation, no fuss, no mourning just take me away. OR, what i might do is to be cremated with the music to everybody entering "Fire" by Arthur Brown, no eulogy and music out "Send for the fire brigade" by The Move. Quite poignant being as Roy Wood wrote it and I was drinking with him in 1971. What should I go for?

a reply to: DAVID64
In the anticipatory grief stage at this time. The end is coming for my spouse and we have planned basically what you have posted. Gathering of friends and family. A few drinks and munchies. Pictures to help spur the stories of his life and how he has become such a treasure for our family, friends and neighborhood. Lots of good memories to be shared.

a reply to: DAVID64

AMEN!

And don't dare spend a bunch of money on my bones. By the kids ice cream, instead.

You guys need to have an ATS party when I leave to celebrate me going when I kick the bucket. I won't be making all those long drawn out posts anymore, but don't make the celebration too obvious that others will know why you are all really celebrating.

a reply to: DAVID64

How old was your mother in law?

I want my cremated ashes put into pepper shakers etched with the words EAT ME distributed to random truck stop diners across the Southwest.

a reply to: rickymouse

December 14th would have been her 73rd birthday.