Mother's Day

I picked up the newspaper this morning and turned to the obituary section as I normally do. Being that today is Mother's Day, there were two pages of "In Memoriam Mother's Day Tributes". These small memorials consist of a picture and a short verse, usually a poem, written by the children of the deceased mom.

As a funeral director, I spend a good portion of my time sitting across the table from bereaved families trying to deal with the loss of their mother or father. Almost without exception, the death of the mother is harder to take. There is something about the love we receive from our mothers binds their hearts to ours in a way that is different than our fathers.

In our busy lives, it's easy for us to forget to call our mother and tell her that we love her and appreciate all she's done for us, and it is even harder to find the time to go and see her. Mother's Day is the perfect excuse to put our other distractions on hold and spend some quality time with mom.

Believe me, an hour or so spent with mom today either in person or on the phone means far more to her than a small ad in the paper after she is gone.

Happy Mother's Day Mom. I love you.

The Eulogy

Eulogies are very hit or miss. They are either very good or very bad. I can't tell you how many bad ones I've sat through over the years. In my opinion, a bad eulogy is one that is all about the person doing the eulogizing and not the deceased. More often than not, that's how they go. Another category of bad eulogies are what I refer to as the "Meatball Eulogy". As you can imagine, a "Meatball Eulogy" revolves around what a good cook the person was, and how they made the best meatballs. I'm not kidding. A good 50% of all eulogies I've heard center on the making of meatballs.

A good eulogy is like finding a diamond in the rough. Every now and then, a person perfectly captures the essence of their departed loved one in a profound and loving way. It's about the love they shared and the lessons they taught that made the lives of others richer, and the world they lived in better. It's hard to do, believe me, but when it's done correctly, it's inspiring.

I heard such a eulogy this morning. It started off a little rough, but it built into a wonderful testament to a life well-lived. As I sat there, I couldn't help but think that if my daughter could say about me the things this woman said about her father, I would have truly lived a good and blessed life.

I've got a lot of work to do.

Burial Rites

Another benefit to being in this profession is the ability to witness many different burial rites. The difference between Eastern Orthodox Catholics and Roman Catholics, for example, is significant. Or should I say, seems significant, since the Eastern Rite is usually conducted in the native language of the church such as Greek, Russian, or Armenian.

The Roman Catholic Burial Mass, of which I am most familiar, is generally an upbeat pep talk designed to offer prayers to lift the soul of the departed to Heaven and to ease the sorrow of the ones left behind. Uplifting songs such as "On Eagles Wings", "How Great Thou Art" and "All I Ask of You" are sung at almost every mass. Every now and then, a family will force me to ask for a non-religious song, which I know will only lead to my being ridiculed by whichever priest I make the request. Songs such as "Knockin on Heaven's Door" by Guns N' Roses or "My Way" by Frank Sinatra are destined to be turned down.

In addition to the nice music, the liturgy, or readings, are full of hope and comfort. The priests, who wear white by the way, generally do a nice job in conveying a positive message. It's as if admission into heaven is a foregone conclusion, and these prayers are just a formality.

The Eastern Rite Mass seems very morbid and dreary in comparison. Again, I'm only speculating because I, and seemingly everyone else in the church, can't understand a word of it. The priests wear long black robes and the alters are usually covered up. The music sounds somber and serious. It reminds me of a 16th century requiem in its power and beauty. The atmosphere inside the church conveys the feeling that this is for real, and the centuries of tradition reverberates in every deep sounding chant of the priest.

Guitar strumming, "Let There Be Peace On Earth" singing musicians definitely need not apply.

From what I know, the liturgy of the Eastern Rite is geared toward asking for forgiveness of whatever sins were committed during life. They seem to take Judgment Day much more seriously than their counterparts in Rome.

The bottom line is that dealing with death is extremely difficult. I strongly believe that during this time of grief and turmoil, it is vital to have some sort of tradition to fall back on in order to put some structure, and more importantly, meaning into it all.

Funeral Rites, be they Christian, Buddhist, Muslim or whatever, give us that strength to properly bury our dead and help us move on with our lives.

I wonder if the priest will allow "Stairway to Heaven" by Led Zeppelin to be played in church during my funeral? I'm going to have my family insist that the funeral director ask.

I wish I could see the look on his or her face!

Urban Legend

Being as I've been around the funeral business for much of my life, I've come across many people who have relatives, or friends of relatives, who have also worked in the funeral business, usually in a menial capacity such as car washer or pall bearer. Inevitably, these people I come in contact with relay a story to me, which has been told to them via an uncle or a friend of their father's. The stories are remarkably similar with very few variations.

They usually begin with originator of the story picking up a body with the funeral director or simply just hanging around the funeral home, because of course, they were good friends of the owner. All of a sudden, without so much as an "excuse me", the body sits straight up, scaring the whits out of the poor worker. At this point of the story, the funeral director usually laughs and tells the person that it happens all the time.

Now, as anyone who has made it past 9th grade biology would know, there is ZERO chance of a dead human body sitting straight up as described in these stories. Zero! Of course, I relay that fact knowing full well that the person telling the story would swear on a stack of Bibles that it actually happened, even though he didn't actually see it and only heard the story second or even third hand.

I apologize to those of you reading this blog who have been told by an uncle or the mailman's cousin that this happened to them, and you believed it. It didn't. Trust me. However, please don't let it prevent you from telling it to the next funeral director you meet.

We love hearing it.

Love, Loss and Pain

Many people think funerals are all about caskets and religious services. Receiving lines and eulogies. In my opinion, funerals are all about love. More specifically, they're the beginning of a long and painful journey of dealing with the aftermath of lost love.

St. Paul wrote in his first letter to the Corinthians:

Love is patient, love is kind.
It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.
It is not rude, it is not self-seeking.
It is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth.
It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails.

As a funeral director, my biggest challenge is helping people deal with the pain of grief after the loss of a loved one. I can tell you with absolute certainty that the greater the love, the greater the pain. I can also tell you that this pain is very real. The pain of watching a parent or grandparent grow old and start to fail is real because the love is real. The pain of losing a spouse or a child is intense because the roots of love run very deep. Love always perseveres. Love never fails.

The question often asked is "How can the pain be taken away?" The answer is it can't. Because to take the pain away would mean to take away the love. Pain is the price we ultimately pay for love. It is inevitable. Love always perseveres. Love never fails.

The people that handle this grief the best are the ones that do not try to avoid the pain, but embrace it. By embracing it, you're acknowledging the love. Over time, the pain will begin to lessen, not because your love has diminished, but because you've become used to dealing with it. I've seen it time and again.

I'll conclude with a quote from Alfred Tennyson because I believe it says it all.
"I hold it true, whate'er befall; I feel it, when I sorrow most; 'Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all."

What's The Hurry?

For centuries, funeral processions have been the way we honor our dead as we take them to their final resting place. Tradition has it that when a funeral procession passes, we pay our respect by pausing what we are doing and acknowledging the life that just ended as well as our own mortality. There are still a few people out there that subscribe to this philosophy. Unfortunately, there is an ever growing number of people that don't.

I get to see this latter group almost every day. An ever increasing amount of people see funeral processions as nothing more than an inconvenience at best, and in some cases, an outright insult. In any event, the twenty-nine second delay caused by the funeral procession is somehow keeping them from getting somewhere extremely important.

Perhaps they are doctors in a rush to get to the hospital to perform emergency surgery. Maybe they're secret agents with only seconds remaining to defuse a nuclear bomb. I suspect however, that these two scenarios are rare. In most cases, they're simply people in a rush to get to the tanning booth or the store to buy cigarettes.

It's not enough for some people to vent their frustration by giving me the finger or yelling obscenities. Some take drastic action.

I've seen people drive up onto the sidewalk in order to avoid stopping to let a procession pass. Just the other day, I had to stop the procession, get out of the car, and forcefully make some guy pull out of line because he had gotten in between the family limousine and hearse and refused to leave.

My favorite incident happened about ten years ago. We were in a procession traveling on the freeway when I saw in my rear view mirror an old beat up Pontiac trying to pass us at a rate of speed I would have thought impossible for such a car. The only problem was that the lane he was in was about to end. In his mind, I'm sure he thought that old heap had it in her to make it past us before the road ended. Unfortunately for him, it wasn't meant to be. He lost control of the car, spun around about eleven times, and came to a rest in the median. It seemed, as I gleefully rode by and waved to him, that all four tires were flat, and he was wishing he had not been such an ass.

These episodes are becoming far too frequent to the point that motorists riding in the processions are taking notice and relaying their experiences to me. Most are shocked. Many are angry.

In the end, we're all going to have to face the reality of riding in the limousine as we take our loved one to their grave. Even the guy who flipped me off last week will have his turn, and I guarantee that he would not be pleased being on the receiving end of such treatment.

Life is too short to be rushing around all of the time. The next time you're in a hurry and a funeral procession is slowing you down, take that opportunity to pause for a moment and reflect on what is truly important in your life. I'm guessing that whatever you're in a rush to do at that moment isn't even in the top fifty.

The King of Sampson Avenue

Most people I talk to think I have the worst job in the world. Sometimes it is tough, but most of the time, such as today, I would not trade it for any other.

We had a funeral service for an mentally handicapped gentleman who had spent his entire life under the care of others. The past thirty were with the same organization. When I was making the arrangements for this service with a few of the directors of this group, they shared with me some stories about this man. From what they conveyed, I knew he was someone very special to them.

I asked if they expected a large attendance at the service, considering it was not going to be advertised in the newspaper. They informed me that there would be a considerable number of people there. They were right.

At 2 pm, people started to arrive. Honestly, I was surprised by the numbers. There was a large group of fellow residents of the various homes he lived in over the years as well as a great number of caregivers, both past and present.

The funeral home was filled when the service started thirty minutes later. It began with his favorite song. I don't remember the name of the song, but Vince Gill was the artist. Some of his friends were singing along. Under ordinary circumstances, the singing that occurred would be unwelcome, to put it nicely. But in this setting, it was beautiful.

When the song was over, the director of the organization said a few prayers and invited others in the room to come up and share their stories. They referred to him many times as "The King of Sampson Avenue", which is the name of the street he lived on.

I was amazed at the number of people who got up to share a story. Both caregivers and friends came up and relayed how this man touched their lives. The feeling of love that poured out of these people for him was immense. The recurring theme was that he truly loved everyone he came in contact with, and that the feeling was reciprocated by all he met.

As I stood there observing from the back of the room, I couldn't help being overcome with the emotion as it swept through like a giant wave. My eyes welled up beyond my capacity to hold the tears back, and I had to leave. Thank goodness I didn't have to direct anything because, at that point, I don't think I could have.

The service ended with Dean Martin's rendition of "That's Amore", and slowly some of the people started to leave. The somber look that everyone walked in with was gone and replaced by smiles and tears of joy. It was as if all at once, everyone came to the realization that he was finally at peace, and although they'll miss him terribly, he was in a better place.

You see, you don't have to be a well-known politician to have a positive affect on the lives of others. You don't have to be magnate of industry or a famous actor to make the world a better place. Sometimes, all you have to be is the King of Sampson Avenue.