funeral plans

[Airehead ★]

Tim and I have been writing down our final wishes.  He wants the Rolling Stones, "You Can't Always Get What You Want" as his closing song.  That feels just weird to me.

He also wants Josh Groban's "To Get Where You Are" and Amazing Grace.

 

HAve you given this any thought?  I am still working on my list.

[Dirtyhip]

Just now, Airehead said:

HAve you given this any thought?  I am still working on my list.

Nope.  Not at all.  

[Longjohn ★]

How about “Another one bites the dust”?

[shootingstar]

I haven't thought of a song with lyrics.

Some classical (baroque) instrumental music pieces.  Some family members do appreciate this era of music. Not all. So I better choose some zippier pieces or pieces with variety of different tempo.  There is one with a baroque trumpet...it's famous from this era. but it's like an elegant TAPs longer piece.  People can fall asleep/reflect or talk amongst themselves.  

I might have my blog roll or flash....gives a snippet of what I saw /wrote, enjoyed in life, etc.  Gosh I'm telling you guys, but my own family doesn't know yet...

[donkpow]

Not really. I have been thinking about leaving my body for science. Cheaper than the usual way.

[petitepedal ★]

I have a favorite Canticle of the Sun song based on St Francis of Assisi...picked out..

The people who are my health care agents are friends from church...I think they would do it well...I should probably review it.

[Airehead ★]

15 minutes ago, shootingstar said:

I haven't thought of a song with lyrics.

Some classical (baroque) instrumental music pieces.  Some family members do appreciate this era of music. Not all. So I better choose some zippier pieces or pieces with variety of different tempo.  There is one with a baroque trumpet...it's famous from this era. but it's like an elegant TAPs longer piece.  People can fall asleep/reflect or talk amongst themselves.  

I might have my blog roll or flash....gives a snippet of what I saw /wrote, enjoyed in life, etc.  Gosh I'm telling you guys, but my own family doesn't know yet...

Exactly why we are writing it down-- our family doesn't know either.

[Randomguy]

51 minutes ago, Airehead said:

Tim and I have been writing down our final wishes.  He wants the Rolling Stones, "You Can't Always Get What You Want" as his closing song.  That feels just weird to me.

He also wants Josh Groban's "To Get Where You Are" and Amazing Grace.

 

HAve you given this any thought?  I am still working on my list.

He is planning on killing you, sounds like, and wants you to be prepared. 

[Further]

 

[shootingstar]

31 minutes ago, shootingstar said:

I haven't thought of a song with lyrics.

Some classical (baroque) instrumental music pieces.  Some family members do appreciate this era of music. Not all. So I better choose some zippier pieces or pieces with variety of different tempo.  There is one with a baroque trumpet...it's famous from this era. but it's like an elegant TAPs longer piece.  People can fall asleep/reflect or talk amongst themselves.  

I might have my blog roll or flash....gives a snippet of what I saw /wrote, enjoyed in life, etc.  Gosh I'm telling you guys, but my own family doesn't know yet...

Here is 1 of the instrumental pieces that I like.  I like it for its lfight wistfulness and the trumpet piece is the arc of a person's life. 

 

[Parsnip Totin Jack ★]

I’m putting together a list myself. Must haves include “ It ain’t nobody’s fault but mine” by Carolyn Wonderland. Closing song will be “I shall be released” by the Band. A lot of other good cuts on the list too. I want people to have a good time. 

[BR46]

This will be my song. 

This song always sticks in my head. As I was leaving the funeral of a good long time friend who died in a auto accident this was the first song that came on the radio when I started the car. 

 

 

[shootingstar]

19 minutes ago, Old#7 said:

I’m putting together a list myself. Must haves include “ It ain’t nobody’s fault but mine” by Carolyn Wonderland. Closing song will be “I shall be released” by the Band. A lot of other good cuts on the list too. I want people to have a good time. 

Well, come to think of it, if I had 1-2 Motown hits added, it might wake up....the wake.  

[MickinMD ★]

1 hour ago, Airehead said:

Tim and I have been writing down our final wishes.  He wants the Rolling Stones, "You Can't Always Get What You Want" as his closing song.  That feels just weird to me.

He also wants Josh Groban's "To Get Where You Are" and Amazing Grace.

 

HAve you given this any thought?  I am still working on my list.

I been strongly involved in three funerals of relatives and every time I recalled the episode of All in the Family where Archie Bunker is getting stuck with the bill for one of Edith's homeless relatives who died at their house while visiting.  Archie wants the most minimal funeral possible until the funeral home owner reminds him, "Remember, funerals are for the living, not for the person who died."

I'm going to be cremated. There will be a small ceremony held at the funeral home where I want my friends and relatives to remember me as they wish by telling something amusing that happened to them with me.  Because the family will be upset otherwise, there will then be a funeral mass held in a Catholic church. If I can arranged it. The still living former kids with whom I sang in the school choir and sang the Latin Requiem Mass during the parishes funerals will sing the sad and beautiful "Requiem Eternam."

The final funeral reception will be held on the Harbor Queen or one of the other Party Boats that run from Baltimore to Annapolis and back during the evenings and will be a party. At some point, while no one running the boat is looking, my siblings will dump my ashes in the Chesapeake Bay so my minerals can build the next generations of crabs and fish.

Of course, I may not be of sound mind as I approach the end, but the cremation and the Party Boat have been promised me by my younger siblings.

[sheep_herder ★]

1 hour ago, Airehead said:

HAve you given this any thought?  I am still working on my list.

Not sure I will have a funeral, and no I've not thought about it.

[Airehead ★]

1 hour ago, donkpow said:

Not really. I have been thinking about leaving my body for science. Cheaper than the usual way.

Won’t your love ones still want a memorial service?

[Indy]

Never been to a funeral where they played music like that.

 

Wife and I are agreement, cremate us and do whatever without ashes.  We would like to be dumped at Salamonie reservoir, but at that point, we are dead and ash so don't really give a shit either.

 

Funeral, don't care, we are dead and no one is showing up to see us anyways, so it's up to the kids what they want to do since people will be there for them.

[Indy]

1 hour ago, Longjohn said:

How about “Another one bites the dust”?

Followed by Highway to Hell for me.  Sure seems appropriate.

[maddmaxx ★]

No funeral.  I suppose womaxx's irish side will have to have a wake but no funeral is my wish.  I don't know why it matters though as I won't be there to care one way or the other.

[Forum Administrator]

My parents have everything planned. I mean everything....  down to the place where the after funeral luncheon will take place. As the person who will be taking care of all of the details, they made my life much easier.  I truly look at that as a gift because I won't have to worry about doing too much when I am mourning.

As for me, my family knows my wishes....  I want to be cremated in the cheapest box they can find. I don't care what happens to my ashes. The only song I want played is the Prayer of Saint Francis.  I have also made it known that if anyone plays On Angel's Wings at my funeral, I will haunt them forever. I hate that song.

[Kirby ★]

I haven't written anything down, but I appreciate that my parents did.  My Dad had a special Irish poem that he wanted on his memorial cards and while my Mom didn't list particular songs, she'd specified a particular modern composer she liked and her good friend sang at the service.  I just went to a funeral for a long time family friend this morning.  She was adamant that she didn't want flowers and she didn't want a big wake.  It was good she let her feelings be known because it saved her children spending a lot on things she wouldn't want and they were comforted thinking that the service was consistent with what she'd want.

My parents even put up their headstone before they died so they could get what they wanted and we wouldn't have to deal with it when they passed.

[groupw]

My dad chose to be cremated. Mom wanted a simple casket for a viewing. Many of her generation find that necessary. I don’t. We placed his ashes above the backstop of the shooting range he enjoyed with some of his closest friends. The guy who owns the range said it would be great to have Dad watching over them. I replied that if you see the dust cloud from hitting Dad, your shot high! Mom laughed. He didn’t get it. 
 

One of my best friend’s dad was a mail carrier. Every Friday they would gather at the Sportsman Bar and play “Mack the Knife” on the jukebox. My friend chose that as the last song of the service. His mail carrier friends loved it!

We haven’t decided those, yet. But our kids know I want cremated and I want the service to be a celebration of life. I hope I’ll be missed, but I want the service to be more of remembering the good parts! 

[Forum Administrator]

1 hour ago, Airehead said:

Won’t your love ones still want a memorial service?

A good friend of mine left her body to science. They had a memorial service. It was a bit different because the body was not embalmed and there was a noticeable difference. It wasn’t bad, just different. 

[dinneR ★]

I've given the eulogy at three funerals. At my father's I read Jane Kenyon's Let Evening Come. It was a short eulogy. The priest was surprised, kind of expected me to go on. I think the relatives all appreciated the brevity.

For mine, I'd like Tom Waits the Train Song with the joke at the beginning and someone serving shots of whisky. Something by the Replacements too. Unsatisfied. 

Listen to the joke, it's damn funny. 

 

[The_Karen_Cooper_Incident]

I highly suspect that when I die, they will never find the body.  So there will be no need for a funeral or music. 

I live a seedy separate life I have never mentioned on the forums.  I'm a double agent.  I work for the Greenville Neighborhood Watch Posse and old remnants of the KGB.

Folks, I've seen things I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy -- empty Little Debby packets and krokodil addicts.

Mudkipz

[Ralphie ★]

Just now, Indy said:

Never been to a funeral where they played music like that.

I've only been to one, with Neil Diamond's Forever in Blue Jeans.

I would imagine a church would balk at Highway to Hell.

 

[Parsnip Totin Jack ★]

 

[donkpow]

10 hours ago, Airehead said:

Won’t your love ones still want a memorial service?

It's possible. I have no children and I may outlive all my siblings even though they are younger than me. I have lived a peculiar life so most people will understand my passing without ceremony.

For the rest, they won't have donkpow to kick around any more. 

[Tizeye]

What if they don’t play it. What are you going to do about it?
 

Reminds me of our wedding. We picked out a ‘modern’ version of the vows, and the priest ignored and reverted to traditional. Oh well, it’s over, time for the honeymoon. Then again, the priest was later diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor...so, are we really married?

[Ralphie ★]

1 hour ago, donkpow said:

It's possible. I have no children and I may outlive all my siblings even though they are younger than me. I have lived a peculiar life so most people will understand my passing without ceremony.

For the rest, they won't have donkpow to kick around any more. 

Both of my neighbors who died had no funerals. 

[groupw]

I was working on the computers at a funeral home in the offices. The singer was doing a horrid interpretation of "Wind Beneath My Wings". We were talking about overused songs and then I asked what some of the more unusual were. She said my friend's dad was one of them! She said even though they are non-denominational, they still believe there should be some reverence so they will not play "Highway to Hell". One young woman who passed loved to dance to "Tequila Makes My Clothes Fall Off". They told her family no to that one as well. 

[jsharr ★]

I would like Scout Vespers played/sung at my funeral. 

Amazing Grace would bring tears, but then again, Scout Vespers makes me cry, so there is that.

I do not want anything fancy.  Simple cremation and if acceptable, I would like my ashes scattered at Camp Wisdom, Camp James Ray and Camp Trevor Rees-Jones.
 

 

[12string]

I've had this discussion with my mother.  She said we could pick out songs, as long as they are uplifting.  Said she doesn't want people crying, she wants them singing and clapping.  I told her not to worry, people will be applauding when she passes.

Funerals are for the living,   I'll let the people left behind pick the music they need, I won't care by then.  Being that I deal with funeral planning and music as part of my church job, I do have a different perspective.  I do find funeral Masses to be generally the most joyful Masses (even when they are sad)

[Allen ★]

I’m to be cremated and thrown into the pond along with the ashes of my dogs. 
Have not put a single thought to music. 
 

My mother planned her own funeral to the last detail. My uncle, who officiated, said, “Bunky, funerals are for the living.”

Mother’s response, “Not this one.”

[Mr. Silly]

Black Muddy River by the Grateful Dead would be nice especially if it included a 20 jam.  

[Razors Edge ★]

19 hours ago, Dirtyhip said:

Nope.  Not at all.  

Someone else's problem for once!  I'm dead, so I couldn't give a rat's ass what happens after that

Spread my ashes, don't spread my ashes, snort my ashes, bake with my ashes, whatever floats your boat.

[BR46]

I told my son to take some of my ashes for a final lap around Road America and on the second lap open the box. Take the rest of my ashes and put me on the back of my old Harley drive through the mountains and let me fly.