Do you ever just wake up and not feel like yourself??????
Well I’m having one of those days.
Its a very gray day. Gray Gloomy Cold Dreary….. Blah!!! I was driving into work (more blah!) and listening to Bob and Tom on the radio. They were talking about fun things like planning Chicks funeral. They were asking about burning him outside. Well that got me thinking about the old westerns I had seen where they burn the heroic dead Indian on the funeral pyre. Seems like a good way to send your body off. Then since I knew I could never have that type of funeral, I started wondering, what kind of funeral would I like to have if I could plan my own.
The first thing that popped into my head was where would I like to be buried? Upon further reflection I decided that once I am dead whatever it was that made me, me was gone. Same goes for my loved ones. So it didn’t really matter.
Then I started wondering what type of funeral would I like. When I was younger, I always thought the entire concept of the funeral was bad. If I had to have one, the people of New Orleans had the right idea. A casket being carried down the street with a New Orleans jazz band following behind. People dancing, drinking, clapping and carrying on. Passers by joining the parade, because it looked fun! But on a dreary day in Indiana its hard to imagine anyone following the parade in this cold.
Then I went back to the whole funeral pyre idea. I think the American Indians had the right idea. You wake up one morning and decide today was the day you were going to die. So you gather your spear and a buckskin ground cloth. March up to the top of a scenic hill or mountain, start singing, watch the sunset, and die peacefully. The only problem was that that rarely worked. Usually the Indian just woke up the next morning realizing that it wasn’t death he felt the day before, just indigestion.
Since I was having trouble deciding where or how my funeral would take place, I decide to think about who would show up. I was at a selling seminar one time and the speaker told me (well not just me. He told everyone there!) that we should have a minimum of 250 people in our sphere of influence. He came up with that number based on the amount of people who “on average” would attend either your wedding our your funeral. Now I was married at a very young age. We neither knew nor could we afford a wedding with 250 people. This did not depress me until I started thinking about it in the context of the conversation going on in my head today. Who would come to my funeral?
The obvious, friends and family co-workers. Family would be less than 50. Friends and co-workers the same. Where am I going to get the other 150 participants in my funeral? I have always carried a lot of life insurance. I wonder if you can find mourners for hire? I suppose I could make the horn section of my New Orleans Jazz band bigger. What about B list celebrates. A few years ago I probably could have got a good deal on Flava Flave, the guys who played Bobby Brady or Chachie, and Danny Bonadouchi, but thanks to VH1 they are probably booked up now. Maybe David Haselhoff? If his handlers can keep him sober long enough to act sad at a funeral?
If you could have anyone (celebrity, politician, or other) you choose come to your funeral….
Who would you have deliver your eulogy?
Who would you have sing?
Who would you have console (hopefully) your family?
wagsway 