When funerals become like French homework

I'm currently taking a little break from writing a funeral. In the name of research, you understand, I'm listening to the music that we'll be playing.

This funeral is for the second member of a family that I've had the honour of dealing with. A few months ago, I conducting a ceremony for a gent. His sister liked the funeral and so I have been selected to do the honours, now that she has died.

In many ways, this is very gratifying - you know you're doing the right thing, if they ask for you again.

Or do you? Is it just familiarity and therefore easy?

Having met the lady's husband, he just wants me to do pretty much the same funeral again; same music, same format.

But do I use the same words? As we give our folks a copy of the words after the ceremony, I want it to be close in tone and concept, but not identical, to emphasise the difference between brother and sister and the creation from scratch of each ceremony. I'm not sure if this is about professional standards, writing something unique for the customer, or my ego, but whatever the motive, the end result is the same.

I am sitting here (the Bach's finished, so I'll get back to the writing in a minute), trying to find new words for the same ideas. As time has passed since the first ceremony, I like to think that I am a little better now and have a slightly stronger phrase here and there.

But, as discussed before, the concepts are the same (the cycle of nature really hasn't changed that much in the last few months).

This is why it's like French homework; I have the actual words and I'm trying to paraphrase them into something better.

Suddenly I feel thirteen again, trying desperately to find a new, innovative (and not the same as Janice Schofield's) way of translating "Ah, voila Jean-Paul, a l'entree du jardin publique....."


Bon chance, mes amis

It seems that I'm more provincial than I hoped.

This feels a bit confessional.....

I grew up in a village which had a paper mill and a psychiatric hospital. This has given me a fairly relaxed attitude to mental health and a love of stationery. But not much else.

(The village also had five pubs and three social clubs but, thankfully, I didn’t grow up with a drink problem).

Much as I try to be PC, open-minded and terribly right-on, old prejudices are still in my brain. Take a recent ceremony. My “bit” was followed by a semi-druid ceremony (I’m calling it “semi”, because, as far as I could tell, none of the people were actual druid priests and the folks seemed to have quite a mix of beliefs and ideas, rather than being committed to one particular approach – I think that’s what was getting to me, as much as anything).

It is, perhaps, unusual to have this with a humanist ceremony. Again, it was all a bit of a mish-mash; the deceased had been raised within a faith, but moved away from it. I think I was chosen as somewhere near “neutral” – a blank canvas, if you will, and also because the FD (correctly) guessed that although I wouldn’t lead anything pagan/new age/“alternative”, I wouldn’t object to it either. The friends of the deceased were also a mixed bunch who had developed their own belief systems, taking bits here and there.

I genuinely and truly respect all of this.

But I still wanted to laugh at the first sight of a robe.

Especially when the man wearing it was talking on a mobile and carrying all of his stuff in a Tesco’s bag (although I was pleased to see that it was a “bag for life”).

Was this nervousness on my part? Hysteria caused by the unfamiliarity of it all? Or am I just a bit of a pleb?

There were bits of the ceremony that I liked very much – the sharing of bread and wine (mmm – sound familiar?), with the wish that those present would never be hungry or thirsty. But some of it, calling on spirits, gods and goddesses just wasn’t my cup of English Breakfast.

Of course, as with all ceremonies, my opinions are unimportant; I am there for facilitate which, I hope I did, paying a tribute to the deceased before handing over to the family members who wanted this variation on a ritual. Had there been anything that I was really unhappy about, I would have tactfully suggested that another person might be better at leading their ceremony.

And, of course, all things are relative. There were two pieces of music played. One was a track from the eighties that I knew well, but was considered experimental in its day. The other was a more modern chant, which I thought was just a bit weird and tree-hugging. I played them both to someone younger than me – she thought the chant was fine, but didn’t like the eighties thing – thought it was a bit weird and tree-hugging.....

Perhaps (as many times in life) the music that has taught me the lesson - things are only weird to those experiencing them for the first time. When they are familiar, they become part of our normal.

Ultimately, the family and friends had the ceremony that they wanted; a tribute, time for prayer and  their ritual and that’s all that matters.

For me? It was an interesting experience to observe, and taught me a little about myself. Mainly, I learnt that although it’s not big or clever, robes make me smile.

I am a woman with many hidden shallows.

The loneliness of the long-distance celebrant?

Maybe it's the winter.

Maybe it's the post-Christmas lull

Maybe it's my age.

But I really miss having day to day contact with colleagues.

Now, I'm not running back to the "proper" job - there are more things that I don't miss, trust me. But sometimes, this can feel like a lonely business. We have colleagues, and we work well together (in some, if not all cases) but we are also, sometimes, in competition with each other, and so it doesn't always feel as though we're pulling together.

And our good friends in the dismal trade are also (in the main) jolly good chaps. We live in the same town, we may run into each other, occasionally, outside of work, but we are reliant on them for our income and they can choose whoever they like - we cannot assume that we will get the gigs.

So what is it that I'm actually after? Do you know, I'm really not sure - this is another of those muses sent out into the universe. I'm not lonely in general, I'm lucky enough to have a close family and good friends. It's just this self-employed business takes an awful lot of getting used to!

Peace and love to all.