A Funeral

Yesterday my mother and I drove for four hours to spend one hour at a funeral service for my Aunt Ruby.  I normally would have found reason to bow out of this type of thing except that my father got sick and bowed out first.  This left the driving and escorting mother to me.  This was to be a closed casket affair and we were going to pay our respects and leave the funeral home prior to the casket leaving for the church.

Best laid plans.

Small towns being what they are in rural Mississippi, we found out from the gas station attendant that the casket was already at the church.  When we arrived we were chagrined to notice it was an open casket viewing.  Oh, joy.  I have a real problem, family or not, standing next to an empty shell, that the soul left days ago, for the express purpose of saying goodbye.  Can't this be done at home?  

The plus to this trip is that I was able to see, not so much visit with, cousins I had not seen since we were ten or twelve years old.  Now we're sixty, they were mourning, I was not wanting to be in the same room with my Aunt's remains, and I made some prophetic comment to my mother about the length of Catholic weddings and funerals.  We took a seat, just to take a load off, and the next thing we knew the minister was taking the podium.  Oh, crap...no escape.  These were not Catholics.  In this part of the country, rural religious fervor is still in full swing.

The minister got up and said a few kind words about the departed, my aunt being well loved and remembered in the small community.  He belted out a well-known spiritual tune, not doing a have bad job at it I couldn't help but think he'd been in choir.  Another young man in his early twenties sat in a chair on stage off to the side.  The minister finished and I was pleased at the short program.  The baton was passed to the younger man.  Hallelujah and praise God...

I am not sure what role this young man's role is in the church, but I do know he was somehow related to Aunt Ruby by marriage.  He was what I would refer to as a typical bible thumping, hell and damnation proclaiming, bloviating minister of the Christian faith.  He spent the next thirty minutes droning volumes and saying nothing.  He quoted scripture, of course, and not just a line or two.  He found it necessary to seemingly quote the entire chapter and verse trying to get the point across.  I closed my eyes, almost fell asleep, mom touched my arm to ensure I hadn't, and I thought to myself, "Just shoot me now."  But, God bless him for giving it the old college try.  Someone needs to get across to this young man what the rest of us old folks have learned with age - less is more.  

Having been bored to tears, and with a solid reminder of why I do not go to any organized religious service, we said our goodbyes and beat feet out of there before the casket left for the cemetery where one just knew more scripture would be read, words would be spewed forth, and crying would ensue.  I reminded my mother of my desire to be burned, urned, set me as a centerpiece on a table and let the party begin!  If they make everyone I know go through what I just sat through I will be pissed.

I think these small communities do this because this is what has always been done.  God bless them for it, but I can't help but think it keeps the fire a sorrow burning much too long and, thus, accomplishes little to help everyone move on.  Lively music, favorites of the departed, free flowing liquor and wine, laughter and anecdotes from the departed's life is a much kinder way to usher them from this life into the next, not that they care as they already left several days before and could certainly care less except to shake their heads as they look down and wonder why their friends and family are putting themselves through an exercise in grief.  I'm certain they would find much more closure knowing all their loved ones are laughing and enjoying remembering their life, than grieving over their loss.

Of course, this is just my opinion.  I could be wrong.