Remember the hospital in "Yes Minister"?

I have a couple of ceremonies coming up and I can't work out if I've been heavy handed or helpful.

The first is for a very elderly gent. He's lived in a nursing home for the last four years, during which time he's had no visitors. There doesn't appear to be any family, or even friends. The only people attending will be the good folks at the nursing home.

What kind of ceremony can we do in a case such as this? The gent's health has been such that the staff don't know a huge amount about his earlier life and so what do we do - they give me the half a dozen facts that they do know and then, on the day, I read them back to them? It seems a bit daft and not much a way to remember someone who's been on the planet for over 9 decades.

So, I suggested to Matron that maybe we could sit and spend time talking about this gent; let the staff who attended share their memories of him. There are things that he used to do that made them laugh, so we're going to remember those things and any other little quirks.

Of course, I'm "topping and tailing" the ceremony, chosen a poem or two that I hope will resonate as well as MC ing the whole thing. I have spent time and thought on this. But it still feels as though maybe I'm copping out a bit.

The other end of the spectrum is the burial of a baby's ashes. This is horrible. The parents of the little girl are, naturally, quite young themselves and they really don't know what to do. I've chatted it through with them, but they feel that they trust me to put something together without a lot of input from them (I've had dealings with the family before). I've made my suggestions, but they seemed to say yes to whatever I've put forward.

So here I am, writing two (albeit very different) ceremonies with minimal input from anyone else. I feel happy that I'm doing my best and putting together caring and meaningful ceremonies. But I'm worred that I don't know what's best for other people.

This post is not an appeal for a ego-massage - I feel comfortable with what I'm writing for these folks and think that all will be well.

I just wondered what others think. I realise that for some, there is very little about the deceased, and a lot about the other things (afterlife/deity/etc) - it's been the subject of a recent Good Funeral Guide post. But I'm not from that end of the scale - the centre of every ceremony I write is the person who has died and that's information I get from the people who knew them.

Anyone else been in this situation? Interested to know that the experience of others is.

But in the meantime, I'm reminded of that hospital from Yes Minister - the one that ran so well without the patients!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-5zEb1oS9A