by Ian Crockett
There’s a school of thought that when cremation is selected, it preempts any type of memorial service or remembrance ceremony. Nothing could be further from the truth. I’ve had two experiences that I consider fulfilling and if I didn’t know better, would say were choreographed by the deceased themselves.
The first experience was with my father. He was 81 when he died and if you asked him it was probably his time since he had lived a very full and interesting life in the field of journalism/advertising (Think Mad Men). He had not taken good care of himself since from the time he was 15, the first thing he would do in the morning was light up a cigarette and the last thing he would do before he went to bed was light up a cigarette. One evening while having dinner with a friend, he got up to go to the bathroom and instead went into his bedroom, lay down on the bed and died peacefully.
Two years earlier I had received a call informing me that he had fallen and broken his hip. He lived alone and couldn’t get to the phone or get his neighbor’s attention, so he spent the night on the kitchen floor. It may sound odd, but that call had more sting in it than the one I received to say he was gone forever since it brought with it a feeling that my family wasn’t invincible after all.
I didn’t grow up around relatives. All my grandparents had died by the time I was five, my mother was an only child and my father had migrated west from Eastern Canada to Southern California. Death and funerals were always experienced by other families, but now it was imminent in mine.
My father leaned very far to the left when it came to his political views. He was one of the first to vocalize his displeasure over the Vietnam War. However when it came to baseball, he was a staunch conservative. He never liked the DH and I always joked that interleague play was one of the things that eventually did him in. He was extremely organized and preached preventative maintenance. When I would say I couldn’t afford to replace my bald tires, he would counter by saying if I get a flat tire, I’ll figure out some way to get the money to fix it, plus pay for all the extra grief I caused myself. He was right as usual.
So I wasn’t surprised when I discovered he had already made his cremation arrangements through a cremation society thus alleviating any burden on me who as the oldest son assumed all responsibilities. He didn’t leave a will which did surprise me, but he may have figured I would know how to disperse his money and belongings.
Since he had pre-planned his options prior to his death, I just needed to pick up his cremated ashes at a designated mortuary. I didn’t think of a service at that time and knew he wouldn’t want anyone making a fuss. However my wife reminded me that memorial services are for the living, so after some discussions with my brothers, we decided on two events.
He had lived at the Inland Empire’s version of Leisure World and was very active prior to the hip incident. His place was adjacent to a courtyard so we set up his favorite easy chair, placed his ashes and other items that represented him and his life such as his favorite Angels ball cap and had a party with all his neighbors and friends.
Following that commemorative event in which I heard some great stories about my father, my brother who lives in Point Loma arranged for a bagpiper to play Amazing Grace while he swam out into the ocean a couple hundred yards with my father’s ashes. This was perfect since my family had spent a great deal of time around the water and we were all swimmers or water polo players. I had planned to join my brother, but had recently injured my shoulder in a basketball tournament.
The wives chose to stay back at my brother’s house, so it was my two brothers and mother, who had been divorced from my father for years, but remained his best friend. Seeing my brother swimming out at dusk with the bagpipes in the background was a special moment and even my father would have tolerated it on his behalf. My wife was right. Memorial services whether they involve cremation or traditional burial are for the living. I would never use the word closure, but it helps put life in perspective and makes it a little easier to move on.
My second experience didn’t find me thinking as clearly, but fortunately I had the people at Fairhaven Memorial Services to lean on. We’ll discuss in my next blog how they rose to the occasion.