Over the years, Celebrations of Life have become the norm—and for good reason.
Instead of gloomily hovering around a casket, reading flower cards like scorecards, and hearing “Sorry for your loss” a hundred times, we started doing things differently.
I never liked that phrase anyway.
Loss? That’s what the bank calls it when they review your profit-and-loss statement and deny your loan.
Mom or Dad isn’t a loss.
They’re a person.
The Oddities of Funerals
The funeral business has its own language and traditions that sound downright strange when you stop and think about them.
The Showing
“We’re going to John’s showing.”
Sounds like a movie premiere.
The body isn’t a first-run film.
The Guest Book
Has anyone ever climbed into the attic years later and said:
“Let’s get out Aunt Dorothy’s wake book and see who showed up—and more importantly, who didn’t?”
The Wake
Another unfortunate choice of words.
Nobody in that casket is waking up.
The Obituary
They usually read like saintly résumés:
“Devoted father. Pillar of the community. Beloved by everyone. Adored his Cocker Spaniel.”
Then comes the list of people he is “survived by.”
Technically, if you’re reading his obituary, he didn’t survive anything.
Prepping the Body
Maybe this sounds better than embalming.
“Aunt Mildred got embalmed this afternoon” sounds like she passed out at a college keg party.
The Corpse
There’s a word nobody puts on a bucket list.
“George enjoyed a successful 30-year career in customer service at GEICO.
And now he’s a corpse.”
Quite a career transition.
Casket or Coffin?
I always thought they were the same thing.
Apparently not.
A casket is the Cadillac model: four sides, hinges, polished metal, fancy satin interior and handles.
A coffin is usually wood, and some don’t even have hinged lids.
You have to pop the top for the showing.
And apparently some handles are decorative.
That could present a challenge for the pallbearers.
Basically:
Sold as is.
No Shoes
The deceased are often buried without shoes.
Apparently feet can swell after death, making shoes difficult to put on.
Shouldn’t be a major problem.
I doubt anybody is hoofing it over to 7-Eleven for a Slurpee.
The Hearse
Do we really need a $150,000 Cadillac beast with a police escort to make a three-mile trip to the cemetery?
Dad spent his whole life telling us to save money.
Then we put him in the most expensive station wagon in town.
Who Gets the Stuff?
Before the first shovel hits dirt, another great family tradition begins:
Who gets what?
In our family, Mom, the grandmothers and the aunts all had beautiful, expensive jewelry.
My sisters sucked that stuff up like a used Hoover.
When Grandpa died, we boys figured our turn had finally arrived.
Maybe some stock.
Maybe a little cash.
My younger brother was so confident that he put a deposit on a Silverado Diesel Duramax.
He told the finance manager that as soon as Grandpa’s inheritance came through, he’d wire the money and pick up the truck.
Then the will was read.
His inheritance?
Grandpa’s 25-year company anniversary watch—with a cracked crystal—and a pair of cuff links engraved with Grandpa’s initials.
The only money my brother got out of the deal was his deposit back.
Celebrating Life, Our Way
Our family learned early that life is too short to spend every funeral being miserable.
When my sister had only about a month to live from an incurable lung disease, we threw her a going-away party.
Cocktails. Dinner. Singing. Stories. Laughter.
My brother even gave her an urn as a going-away present.
Even the priest said it was one of the most incredible sendoffs he had ever witnessed.
And my sister got to be there for it.
When Dad died, we went off-script again.
The hearse made a detour to our family home, where we turned Dad’s casket into a makeshift champagne bar.
We toasted him, told stories, sang songs and finished with one final rendition of “Happy Trails.”
The funeral staff looked on in disbelief.
Dad would have loved every minute of it.
Mom’s Wicker Casket
Then there was Mom.
Mom was a character, so an ordinary casket just wasn’t going to cut it.
We went casket shopping.
The cheap ones looked like tin cans.
The Cadillac models were rustproof, waterproof and probably tornado-resistant.
Nothing seemed like Mom.
Then somebody remembered her white wicker furniture.
For 50 years, our family porch had been filled with it.
So we wondered:
Do they make wicker caskets?
My youngest brother found one online and had it shipped overnight from San Francisco.
One problem.
It arrived in natural wicker.
Mom would have turned over in her grave before we even put her in it.
So my sister started calling auto-body shops, telling them she had a “couch” that needed to be painted white.
The measurements sounded a little strange for a couch, but eventually somebody agreed.
Soon that body shop had pictures of Corvettes, Mustangs, classic cars…
And one beautifully painted white wicker casket.
The grandkids even came up with a jingle:
“A tisket, a tasket, Grandma’s buried in a wicker casket.”
It was perfect.
Funny, heartfelt and completely Mom.
The Takeaway
Funerals don’t have to be gloomy productions filled with awkward phrases, expensive rituals and people whispering around a casket.
They can be about stories, laughter, family and celebrating the person who actually lived the life.
Our family has sent people off with champagne, songs, jokes, an urn given as a present and one custom-painted white wicker casket.
Maybe we don’t do funerals exactly the way we’re supposed to.
But we do them our way.
And somehow, I think the people inside those caskets would approve.
You Cant Make this stuff up 