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Comin' For To Carry Me Home

 
How much better we are at dying, these days! We talk about what's happening to us and how we feel about it. We are more ready to play our part in our demise by drawing up a living will and an ADRT (Advance Decision to Refuse Treatment). The result? We are discovering that the fear of death is worse than death itself; that acceptance dissolves terror and brings reconciliation, even a strange and joyous beauty.

We're still reluctant to think about funerals but we definitely know when we've witnessed "a great send off". Even though out-numbered four to one, the funeral in Four Weddings and a Funeral was the most memorable part! A good funeral has all the elements of all the other great rites of passage, with the addition of majesty and finality. But when did we last go to a good one? Too many are still bleak and meaningless.

When you go to a restaurant, you are well advised to stay out of the kitchen and leave everything to the professionals. Not so with funerals.  But time is short and, when planning the funeral of a loved one, unless you have done a great deal of homework, a meaningful ceremony will be the result of collaboration with an empathic professional - they are rare but they do exist.

It all goes wrong when the funeral director, for the kindest reasons, relieves you of anything to do. A good funeral director will keep you busy. "Would you like to keep your Mum at home? Do you want to come in to wash and dress her? Where would you like to hold the funeral? What do you want to happen at the funeral? Who is going to contribute to it, and how? Who is going to lead it?"

Because there is, you see, so much more to do for this person whom you loved, who has died, than queue up to register their death, then wait for the big, black car to come and take you to the crem. 

Every bad funeral is the same: faultless, seamless, soulless. Sad. Forgettable.

Good funerals are all different, but each contains common elements. They will be the fruit of your partnership with the funeral director and informed by the wishes of the person who has died. Here are three of the best.

First, low-level, cheerful chaos - anything from nervous carrying of the coffin by close family to spontaneous behaviour during the ceremony. The proceedings become full of vitality.

Third, singularity. Create the ceremony according to the culture, customs and language of your family. Renounce conformity. There is no right way, only your way.

A funeral is a sad ritual, of course it is. A good funeral is, too - and so much more besides. A good funeral is a memorable occasion, one you can take pride and quiet delight in. If you're planning one, how will you know when you've got it right.....?

........When you decide to take your camera along.

Charles Cowling - Professional Funeral Advisor