Funeral Rites

Last fall my grandmother passed away after a long, long battle with Alzheimers. Everyone called her Mam-Maw, however, my kidlets didn't have much of a relationship with her since she had gotten sick before they were born. It was to be the children's first exposure to a visitation and funeral.

I wanted to make sure that they felt comfortable asking me any question at all. I described what they'd see before we got there and I emphasized that I wanted them to ask lots of questions about what was happening. My children were little lights of levity as they went from relative to relative through the room. At one point I watched as GooseyGirl walked to her great grandfather from across the room without any prompting from me. She skipped over to him and gave him a big hug without saying a word and then went back to the other side of the room. I watched the warm smile spread over my grandfather's face as he lit up with joy. I was so proud of how she helped ease his sadness in that little moment.

A little while later, I was talking to some of my relatives and RocketMan came up to me and said, "Mommy, I have a question."

I immediately stopped my conversation and focused all my attention on him, "Yes, sweetie. What is it?"

In a loud voice that carried through the funeral home he said, "Why is Mam-Maw hard?"

Ahemmm.... I guess I hadn't been watching my children as closely as I thought.

A few months later we went to the funeral of my cousin's husband. I told them that this man who died was Great Aunt Pauline's son-in-law and that she might be sad. I told them we might want to find some encouraging words for her.

GooseyGirl said, "We should tell her we hope she feels better... and that she needs to get over it."

!!!!!!!

I said, "Well, let's not say THAT."

We picked up my mother on the way to the funeral home. While in the car, I reminded the kids about how we act at a funeral home and what is expected from them. I went over some of the rules like 1) Don't run 2) Use your inside voice 3) Don't poke the dead guy.

In a disappointed voice, RocketMan said, "Ahhhh.... but why?"

"Because it isn't polite to touch the dead person, honey", I said, while watching my mother turn red as she desperately tried to hold back her laughter.

We got to the funeral home and everything was going fine. They gave hugs to our relatives and soon the boys were bugging me to go up for a look at the coffin. As we are headed that way, in the middle of the quiet, reflective funeral home, RocketMan says loudly, "Remember, We can't TOUCH him, right Mom?"

I wanted to crawl under the casket.