I held my tears in until my drive home. And then I came home and slept for 4 hours. This being human thing as a continual apprenticeship to grief. It’s a lotta lot.

Enchanted Living.

The fine print on my business card says ~ “serving Western Washington and beyond.” This ceremony was a beyond day and oh my, was it above and beyond.

 

There was a jazz trio playing her favorite song – The Hallelujah Chorus from Handel’s “The Messiah.” There were video snippets and eulogies galore that affirmed how beauty and enchantment were her love languages. It was quite the event production – slides and cues galore – with flawless logistics – long live tech pros. 

The Ceremonial Hearth of Home.

Perhaps 7% of my funerals work entails getting myself situated in some new ceremonial space on the day-of, assessing the details such as placement of altar tables and ritual items, making sure tech is working, and then finally, delivering my words and becoming the space holder.

 

 

My view was of the park space behind the home, the dozens of faces of her beloveds, and in the distance, the lake she loved to swim in. This was the space where all the stuff of life has happened and where the family weddings and memorials have been held.

Somewhere Over the Rainbow.

 

Basho’s words ~ “the temple bell stops but the sound keeps coming out of the flowers” proved true at a celebration of life for a forever 42 husband and father.

 

Grief is the Very Thing.

And what is it to cease breathing, but to free the breath from its restless tides…and when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance.”
Kahlil Gibran from “On Death”

Bengal Blues.

Undo it, take it back, make every day the previous one until I am returned to the day before the one that made you gone. Or set me on an airplane traveling west, crossing the date line again and again, losing this day, then that, until the day of loss still lies ahead, and you are here instead of sorrow.”
Nessa Rapoport

Fly me west to the days when our precious grandcat Boobie was cancer-free. I want to stand motionless, poised on the international date line, betwixt and between every time – past or future – so that a singular moment that stretches into eternity is all there is – her healthy feline self, perched on her window hammock or cat tree, sweet face tilted towards the sun, leg stretched jauntily off the side, and her beautiful heart beating, still beating, with a vibrant aliveness.

In January of 2024, our daughter’s 11-year-old cat died peacefully at home via Lap of Love in-home euthanasia. We were and remain beyond heartbroken. It was a mutual rescue four years prior, just as the pandemic was having us lockdown a tiny bit earlier here in the Puget Sound than elsewhere.

Our family lived the width of those four years with her but sure wish we’d had all the years before 2020 and many more still ahead of us. My husband and I were like the grandparents who are always scheming to take their grandkids for the weekend – delighted for every moment we got with her and pathetically forlorn when it was time to send her back to her mama.

She was a beautiful snow marbled Bengal-ish cat with so much personality and spunk. In these last two years, she navigated diabetes and more recently, lung cancer. Until she couldn’t.

Pet loss is such an acute and particular grief unlike any other. I loathe that it’s been relegated to a category called secondary loss. There’s nothing secondary about our relationships with our animal companions. As a ritualist, I was thankful to be able to lean into my kitbag of grief rituals and resources. 

And I appreciate that there are folks like DVM Dr. Sarah Hoggan who are writing and talking about it. Her words are comforting and necessary, even and especially for the likes of me – a medical aid in dying volunteer, grief educator, and funeral celebrant who holds space for death on the regular and has lived all kinds of grief…but alas, not this specific one with this indelible cat.

Pet Loss Rituals
Here are a few of the rituals I chose to enact in those time before and after death.

Before she died, I blessed every part of her from head to toe with words of gratitude specific to that part of her – a variation of the blessing many of us use in deathcare. Normally, I would also have done pre and post bathing and anointing rituals but alas, she wasn’t my cat and my daughter was not keen on that idea.

The week prior, however, I made her a shroud by using a face stamp impression of her that my daughter had gifted me for Christmas and stamping that onto a white cloth with word stamps of her name and the word {love}. We then lined her cat basket with it and she ended up being wrapped in this shroud during her drive to Resting Waters, the amazing (best in the west) pet aquamation facility my daughter chose for disposition. Our grandcat’s favorite toy, an orange fishy, accompanied her on the drive and while she laid in grace during the viewing a couple of days later, during which my daughter was able to go and spend time with her alone to help her process her grief and have one last chance to see her in feline form.

During that weekend of grief and sorrow, I set a memorial altar with photos, her cat toys, candles, and other signification items. I then wrote a letter to her, printed it on water soluble paper and included a list of character trait words that best described her. After reading the letter aloud to my husband and shedding an equivalent bowl full of tears, I dissolved the letter into the water and began to float the words onto flower petals to float in my Ripples of Remembrance water bowl that featured a floating candle. As I repeated this gesture of floating descriptive words to then watch dissolve below the surface, I dimmed the lights and placed meditative music.

This water-based ritual was especially poignant because it was happening in tandem with her water-based cremation, which was set to take about 18-20 hours. 

Months later, my daughter set to work sewing an orange fish shaped cushion, a replica of her favorite cat toy. She wrote her own letter to her beloved cat which she then placed inside the pillow. 

I’ve yet to bring myself to craft her written and video tribute yet but I know that in time, it will be cathartic to undertake both of these tasks. In the meantime, I make a point of attending the local humane society’s bi-weekly pet loss group every few months, and I spend time each day, sifting through photos of her on my phone. And alas, the tears are still there. She was a one-of-a-kind cat who will be forever missed and loved. 

Permanent Impress.

“Wind in my hair, I feel part of everywhere
Underneath my being is a road that disappeared
Late at night I hear the trees, they’re singing with the dead
Overhead…”
Eddie Vetter, “Guaranteed”

Eulogies can be incredibly difficult when the grief is so fierce and so I love where the bereaved daughter of this ceremony honoree went with her tribute to her beloved father.

She began by admitting that she couldn’t possibly hold it together enough to share with everyone what her Dad meant to her. So instead, she told them she would speak about his prized possession, his black Ford F-150 truck. By doing so, she said, “you will know what kind of man he was.”

She described how that truck stood out amongst other vehicles, its bells and whistles that made the truck special, how you always knew when the truck was about to show up, the places the truck liked to venture, the music that would get cranked loud, and she spoke of how the truck broke down recently and they weren’t sure it was going to make it. She ended her tribute by talking about how she took her young kids for a spin in the truck – now her prized possession – and how excited they were to be sitting so high up.

Throughout her moving and coded tribute, she managed to cover so many nuances of their complicated relationship without having to speak the things themselves. It reminded me of those assignments we would get in high school English – write about this personal thing but do so through the lens of describing an object.

I could see some family and friends crying – they got it. And I could see some people looking a little disinterested. I’m not sure it landed with them, at least right away.

There’s no one way and one-size-fits-all for eulogizing our peeps. It’s why I encourage families to throw a bunch of things at it. Pass the mic around. Tell the indelible stories. Bring fresh flowers from the garden so there can be beauty amidst the heartbreak. Hand out Tree of Life seed packets that honored your Papa’s pivotal branch in the family tree together with his love for feeding squirrels. Play the songs, like “Back in Black” by AC/DC to end things on a guitar riff.

Bring the stuff that was your person and arrange it so everyone can nod their head and say, ah, yes…his genealogy albums and his Camel cigarettes and his signature red Solo cups that he would buy in sleeves and run through the dishwasher in place of actual real glassware. Have everyone fill out tags with essence words, notes + blessings to the great beyond, or cherished memories ~ and then have them hang their tags on the lit altar tree.

And definitely end that photo tribute with a slide that fades to white with the words, “Forever in Our Hearts.” Let the silence hang in the air for a few seconds and then bring your dearly departed one back for a moment with a video clip or in this case, a sound clip of his voice: “I’m getting smart in my old age. Are there any special washing instructions? Hot? Cold? Permanent press or whatever? Let me know.”

As with washing, so too with how to honor our dead. Let’s stop tucking those urns up on high shelves out of sight. Let your person have a last joy ride in a beloved vehicle like a trusty old pickup truck and then bring them to gathering spaces so that your half-starved grief can be fed a proper meal. Surround their urn with candles, if you wish, and altar them as a way to alter others.

Those are 𝑚𝑦 special instructions. And oh yeah…which setting should you turn the dial to?

As far as I can tell, you can never go wrong with Permanent Impress.

Of High Teas, Family Trees + Me.

In the spirit of arguing that all life is ceremony, I’m a firm believer that each end-of-life moment has the opportunity to hook onto the next one. This is true when we consider what I call the Stations of the Loss – honoring the vigil moments from death to body care and dress, to transport to disposition to funeral and final resting place.

I had the privilege of working with one family who were able to hook one moment of honoring onto the next in tribute to their sibling. They held an afternoon Celebration of Life for him. We celebrated his life in all the ways and then invited his community of mourners, who held a shell or stone in hand that they were given as they walked in, to write their words of blessing or name onto that shell for the family to bring to the Oregon Coast, his favorite spot, where they would be scattering his ashes in the following days.

What would have been a simple water inurnment at sea or scattering now had added significance and silent witnesses in the form of coastal ephemera. I invited them to set a simple altar on the beach in the form of a heart and his initials adorned with these inscribed shells, stones and tealight candles. What that translated to, in the words of Linda Hogan was that they had brought along “the love of thousands,” thereby invoking a larger ceremonial gesture and send-off.

Salt of the Earth.

As a funeral celebrant, I’m often a kind of first responder, wading into the sea of fresh grief with families who are still in a state of shock. Navigating grief’s many complexities and creating a ceremony that offers healing for all involved is often a tall and delicate order. Such was the case with one of my families.

In this particular instance, I was called upon to help a family honor their beloved, son, adoring husband, and devoted dad who had died unexpectedly after a brief but serious illness. His widow wanted to honor his love of the beach and give nod to their salt covenant unity ritual from their wedding a few years ago. And she was certain she wanted a celebration of life in a waterfront clubhouse with gourmet food truck and bar service since so many of his friends and attendees were from out of town. Other family members, however, wanted a more intimate healing circle in order to process their grief in private, and still others wanted to co-weave their own religious beliefs. These differing wishes are not uncommon, yet if left unacknowledged and untended, they can detract from a harmonious gathering. A fellow celebrant and I often note how often our work and skillset necessitates a hint of grief therapy, event planning, and lay chaplaincy.  

It can be tricky ground meeting each family member where they’re at while staying true to serving the needs of my primary next of kin contact. And I will say, staying focused on the Who and Why of the day remains crucial. In essence, we are gathering to honor and celebrate the life of their dearly departed one. Gently reminding them of what their person’s highest wishes and aspirations for the day might be invites everyone to set aside their grievances or differences, if even for a couple of hours. 

Ultimately, we were able to celebrate him with heartfelt eulogies, oodles of stories and memories, tailored readings, and a meaning-filled salt and water blending ritual that allowed this grieving widow and her daughter a way to continue to commemorate him. There was catharsis. There was healing. And there was even the surprise moment when his four-year-old daughter decided she wanted to speak as the microphone was passed around. “I miss my Daddy,” she said. “He was my friend.” Out of the mouths of babes. The silence and astonishment that followed did the heavy lifting of illuminating the enormity of their collective loss. 

I remind my families that Celebrations of Life are not a once-and-done affair. They are often that first (or second) moment of honoring, but assuredly not the only nor the last.

A Tall Texan Tribute.

“You can bury me in some deep valley for many years where I may lay then you may learn to love another while I am sleeping in my grave.”
from “Man of Constant Sorrow” song

While I didn’t share this Texan’s politics or proclivities for totin’ guns, blowing off fireworks on the 4th, tinkering with gadgets or drinking whiskey; I felt enriched by getting to piece together and share his life story and raise a glass to his consciousness during his Zoom memorial. Being from Alberta, I can swear I’ve met many a storytelling and adventure lovin’ grumpy character just like him over the years.

Virtual gatherings became a thing during the pandemic, as we all know, and yet they remain the perfect option for those who need to hold space for friends and family around the world. I worked with the family to piece together all of the ceremonial elements and gestures we might otherwise include during an in-person gathering, albeit with a virtual spin. The altar/memorial table becomes a kind of show & tell moment, for instance. And opportunities to connect with each other more casually are assigned to pre/post chatter or break-out room options.

But tactile symbols, communal rituals, and multi-sensory inclusions abounded during this ceremony. Riffing off the “here’s to whiskey, so amber and so clear” toast, we managed to close with a lyrical toast to his good consciousness with my custom woven words that gave nod to many of his great loves such as camping under the stars, gambling, cheap beer, Folger’s coffee, man’s best friend, Texas thunderstorms, sunsets, barbeques, Martin guitars, and well, whiskey, of course.

Cheers to virtual gatherings like this one that allowed his friends and family, from as far as Israel and as near as the Kitsap Peninsula here in the Seattle area, to come together and honor him with stories, songs, tears, and laughter. And…cheers to ceremonies that save me the pre/post travel & prep time!

A Teachable Memorial.

I’m not one for loitering around after my ceremonies and eating the yummy food but when I was offered a floral arrangement at a community memorial for a local educator in those minutes after stepping away from the podium, I shamelessly said, “Sure!”….because flowers are my weak spot and because when the gal looked me in the eye and said, “you’ve more than earned it!” ~ I humbly accepted her proffering.

It proved affirming to be carrying a large and fragrant bouquet away as some tangible beauty from a powerful memorial of 300 attendees with another 100 or so online. We packed so much into the program. There were 10 amazing eulogists and readers plus video and photo tributes that felt like their friend had come back from the great beyond and was in the room with us.

And yet despite the many elements, their stories all flowed so seamlessly and the whole thing crescendo’ed in a way that you could feel and see: the wave of grief and love reverberated through the room. There wasn’t a dry eye in the room, said celebrant included.

A map of the honoree’s world travels, a Word Cloud activity for everyone to lend their descriptor words to, the gift of student sentiments captured on large paper hearts in a vase to his closest friends, and yumcious nibblies that befit their friend and colleague’s gourmand sensibilities were the small ceremonial garnishes to an otherwise perfect celebration of who he was.

I came home to these words which felt extra special because it was an intense couple of weeks pulling it all together with a large committee of peeps, and because I had been struggling to find my own way into tying a gossamer ribbon upon all the interwoven words:

“This was the most beautiful memorial I have ever been to. Your words were so true and honored his life in a way that was all encompassing, authentic, thoughtful, raw, and polished. You captured more than just his walk through life but his essence of being. It felt like you were channeling his spirit and brought him close to me in that time. Thank you so much for this.”

Sigh…hashtag in awe heart emoji heart emoji for this work I get to do that sometimes feels all-consuming and daunting. And yet, when it comes to the interplay between ceremony, grief, love, and remembrance, I’m with the poet Basho.

Toast + Tributes.

At every turning of my life
I came across good friends,
Friends who stood by me,
Even when time raced me by.”
from “Farewell My Friends” by Rabindranath Tagore

Leading up to the big day, I was a tad apprehensive about how this memorial gathering might go. All the moving parts. Breaking the ceremonial spell to grab food truck pizza and drinks. The potential for things to become a goat rodeo once alcohol and socializing entered the mix. The overly long photo tribute. The disparate crowd of 100+ folks that held perhaps four Democrats and one unabashed socialist/abolitionist, mixed with an eclectic assortment of 2nd Amendment lovers, libertarians, farmers, truckers, and self-professed working-class folk. Not to mention the risk that Rage would come storming into the room and demand its place during the Open Mic to rant about the honoree’s senseless murder. Or that Indignation would interrupt Rage to then sermonize about gun violence or go off sideways about assault rifle ownership.

And yet it all went swimmingly. I had a sense that it might when I awoke from my recurring airplane crashing dream that morning with a memory of how a pilot friend who’d recently died was the one to heroically save the plane in my dream from crashing. I’ve been dreaming this dream for decades and never once has anyone I’ve known – dead or alive – ever saved the day and my life, as it were, in this dream. It was a reminder to me that our collective AAA (ancestors, allies & angels) Roadside Team is always on the beat and altruistically intervening on our behalf…even in our dreams.

I set a soft cushion for grief, healing, and intentional honoring that night, as I truth + dared as many of his friends and family as I could to share their tribute words, either verbally or as a written missive on the table notecards. The Seahawks came up so often in the memory sharing (amongst a sea of most all of us wearing our Seahawks jerseys), that I finally had to quip between speakers, “oh wow, I didn’t know he was a Seahawks fan!”

We laughed and we cried, and we raised our wine glasses and beer cans in toast to the space between us with a communal grunt that was a hilarious nod to his unique way of speaking. We all felt better equipped to do so with gusto because one of his friends had just walked us through the various tones and inflections of the honoree’s grunting language, and what each grunt meant, with emphasis and volume adjusted to communicate agreement, surprise, disapproval, or frustration.

When I drove away towards the main road leading out of the park after things wrapped up, I was immediately greeted with a tiny frog who landed upon my windshield, directly in my line of sight so that all I could do was to hold its gaze in a moment of mindful admiration, before I slowly pulled over to the side of the road, got out of my car, and nudged it to hop away to safety.

Indeed, just as there’s the AAA afterlife crew in the unseen realm, so too is the creaturely cohort of ELTers (Earth’s Living Things) interconnected with us as friends in this tangled web that is really just one long and elaborate ceremony from birth to earth.

My last imprint of the day was the spectacular sunset. Someone was pulling out all the stops, the brushes, and the pantone palettes on the other side of the sky. Or maybe it was a chorus of special someones.

Sung to the tune of you have to believe we are magic.

Faux Funeral.

I technically had 10 years to plan this milestone celebration in honor of my husband’s 60th birthday, because I first conceived of the idea a whole decade ago. But ceremony season got away from me and I ended up slapping together a rather low-key gathering at the 11th hour these past couple of weeks.

But it turned out just fine. We booked the party room in my son’s building, and we made sure everyone was in attendance before he was wheeled in. Most of us wore black and we were able to enjoy a couple of drinks before our sexagenarian arrived.

The only true surprise for hubby, besides the actual attendees, was the compost bin tricked out with kitschy little green slogans, which gave nod to his final disposition wishes to be chucked in the compost bin when he dies and hauled out to the curb on pick-up day.

The “pallbearers” brought him in a moment too early and since I didn’t have “Funeral for a Friend” teed-up properly, I made them wheel him in a second time. Never mind that the supposedly clean compost bin had the sweet smell of Lysol mixed with eau de yard waste going on and that my husband had to deal with that. But he was a good sport. Next time I’ll have to make a point of providing my son with the kind of cue sheet I compile for FDs. So there went my plans for the long slow build-up of the song, getting to play “Pop Goes the Weasel” before the bin lid was opened, presenting him with a daisy after words of tribute, and playing “In Hell I’ll Be in Good Company” by The Dead South as part of a formal recessional.

But….I was at least able to get Curt to later pose for photos in the bin and also stretch out in front of the fireplace for an RIP/highway to hell photo.

The formal program included my words of tribute, some reflections by my son and a friend, followed by the photo tribute and a champagne toast. After dinner and drinks and a SpongeBob cake, because Curt’s a huge SpongeBob fan, (during which we all loudly sang the SpongeBob song), Curt was able to catch a few minutes of a 40-min video compilation of tributes from a host of friends, family, and co-workers.

I had a Polaroid camera and album on display for people to take a picture with him and write a birthday greeting. It was fun to watch everyone interact with him throughout the night in this way.

After we got home and could finally put our feet up, we watched the rest of the video, and it was a treat to see how moved he was by all the vignettes. Kudos to the folks at tribute.co for making it so easy that even my in-laws were able to upload a video clip easily.

Even though I deliberately kept it super intimate and only invited a handful of friends and had Logan and Jonika do the same, it was still a ton of work. I vowed I wouldn’t do anything for his 70th (but I haven’t ruled out his 75th).

Deep work is all but obsolete, but I still contend it’s worth it…especially when it’s about living tributes. We just don’t do enough of this kind of thing. So few of us ever get to hear words of appreciation together with the impacts we’ve made and how we are perennially remembered by others.

It was meaningful to realize how each previous milestone event built on the ones to follow. I was able to repurpose the tribute album I intended to compile after his 40th for the Polaroid greetings. And I displayed the tribute story books from his 50th on the “memorial table,” which were fun to re-read. So many of these written memories echoed the stories we heard in the video tributes.

Indeed, the more he’s changed, the more he’s stayed the same. He still loves cartoons, still says “Sure” to my madcap birthday plans, is still up for donning a new hat, and still offers up that cheesy grin when the camera is pointed his way.

What can I say? The perils of him having married an event planner turned funeral celebrant.

A Loving Dispatch.

The widower I worked with on the Celebration of Life below, who hails from Colombia, was looking for a release ritual to connect to his husband across the veil, and from whom he had been separated during the pandemic. I suggested a Despacho ritual, an Andean ceremonial rite that is endlessly adaptive and endlessly generative. I sent him materials for how to prep his Despacho, craft his healing words, and gather his people.

I spoke to him of the spirit of dispatch, akin to a smoke signal we send upon the ethers from this place to that other one via the red cardinal wings and direction of that sacred one, Sky. And we chatted about earthly gifts and sweet treats to Pachamama as being an important consideration for this ritual.

He chose his husband’s birthday to gather friends and enact the Despacho. This is what he had to say about the experience:

We thanked Mother Earth for the gift of J’s love and all the moments we shared in this life. We added candies, letters, words, and many more items that reminded us of J and how he will always be with us and that would connect his soul to Mother Nature. We lit the Despacho during the sunset, which happens to be Manhattanhenge (a phenomenon where the sunset aligns perfectly on east-west oriented streets of Manhattan). It was so powerful to sit there together and watch it burn in silence. I believe the fire lasted for 10 minutes but the sound of his soul didn’t stop. Now he is connected to nature, to our favorite spot, and to the sunset. Now, every time his energy shows up, I receive it, I enjoy it, and just like the sunset, I let it go… knowing that it will be back again to show me how beautiful life is.”

When I think about this work that I do for a “living,” I’m reminded of words I heard recently in an end-of-life facilitator group I’m in. We were going around the table sharing what we were up to in our EOL work and one facilitator confessed that she hadn’t been doing much because she had to turn to other work to make her “real living.” After the sharing circle, I returned to her words and invited her to consider that a “real living” is not the monetary remuneration we attach to our livelihoods.

Wouldn’t it be great if we didn’t have to hustle to sell the invaluable benefits and noetic effects of good ceremony? Heck yeah. And if we didn’t have to turn tricks on corners just to get our families, couples, communities, and individual clients to weigh in with words of testimony and appreciation thereafter? Don’t even get me started.

We are truthtellers, teachers, and wayshowers, or as I name it, waypointers. We are the medicine people and the modern-day shapeshifters helping to pave a new way forward and guide people back to their “real living.” We are “the ones.” Which doesn’t mean I don’t get salty when I hear what tech bros and college graduates are making as they enter into workplaces with textbook knowledge and little in the way of “real living” wisdom. Capitalism is a grand source of despair. We live in a wholesale mixed-up world.

But when it comes to my own dying, I want to say I did more repair than harm. I want to declare that I pointed people to see sunsets in new ways and to find daily sustenance and meaning through ritual.

Creative Memories.

It was a full-sun day that was by turns sad & salvific on this Pride weekend as family and friends gathered from near and far to pay tribute to their international bright young thing who was like one of those fiery asteroids you see streak across the sky, but in abbreviated human lifespan form.

Things were briefly named during this Celebration of Life – addiction, mental illness, the many middle-of-the-night phone calls to kith and kin, the dance between rehab and relapses. And things were repeatedly claimed, namely his essential ways of being + doing like his hilarity, creativity, zealous drive, and his thoughtfulness. There was no one like him.

The family wanted to honor his LGBTQ+ identity with loads of Pride swag, and his love of Starburst candies, origami, and architecture. So, we cooked up a collaborative collage project using his artwork. And as a wink and a nod to his fondness for strutting his stuff and wearing heels, we played “These Boots…”

People were relieved to be able to talk openly about what one friend called “the high-highs and the low-lows” which she defined as both wonderful and challenging. The transparency and vulnerability of these shared stories moved on his people like an energy swirl. You could almost reach out and touch this invisible, ineffable emotional wave and its slow turning that gyrated like the outermost billows of a dervish’s robe. I’m here to tell you I had to duck a few times. At one point, I could even feel it lodged in my throat for a tender second as I offered heartfelt words of commendation.

I swear I love everything about ceremony but being afforded the bird’s eye view of row after row of mourners that we funeral celebrants are privileged with from our place at the podium is an aspect of memorials that is so dang humbling. I get to be a griefcatcher which is to say, I get to witness delicate humans crack open if only for a small while.

If I ever ran for public office, I would advocate for communal grieving tax credits as incentive to do grief retreats, public vigils, and grief group work. 

Grief is the word, is the word, is the word…

A Noteworthy Remembrance.

You could fly as though you had wings / Head towards the limitless horizon / Like throwing a pebble into water / The circles get larger and larger / With your hands you push open the limits of the universe / You embrace from within / Heaven and earth and the ten thousand things capture your thoughts / The eyes look outside with determination / Up and down your strength flows / You push and you embrace continuously.”

These translated words by this dearly departed honoree describe a mystical/reflective practice of non-movement as a capstone to all the movements that precede it in T’ai Chi. And as with esotericism in martial arts, so, too, with this mysterious journey from birth to breath to death.

We celebrated his giant Renaissance soul in all the ways – with the music of Chopin and Bach and Buffalo Springfield, with the ephemera of his great passions which ranged from martial arts to writing to guitar building and playing, to chess to sailing to orchid-growing to his love and deep study of languages, and with a photo tribute that honored him through all the stages of these compelling pursuits.

His friends and family inscribed their words of remembrance, love, and blessings onto wooden hearts, and these were tucked into a satchel into the open casket with him, along with a blanketing of magenta and white orchids. And as a mitzvah across the veil between this world and the next (and because I have a hopeless soft spot for creative souls), I packaged up some rustic hearts, mini-Bach sheet music scrolls, and a sprig of rosemary, the herbal symbol of remembrance, for his people to take home with them. I charged them, in the words of Rumi, with taking down an instrument, in whatever way that meant for them, and in his honor, letting the beauty they love be what they do.

It was a fitting tribute for a noteworthy man and as always, I feel hella lucky to get to call this my work in the world.

High Flight.

Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth and danced the skies
on laughter-silvered wings; Sunward I’ve climbed,
and joined the tumbling mirth of sun-split clouds,
~ and done a hundred things.”
from “High Flight” by John Gillespie Magee Jr.

The clouds really did part and the sun, that little darling, showed up just in time for the chorus of “Here Comes the Sun.” It was the touch of warmth and slant of light we needed for this November morning inurnment for a naval aviator at Seattle’s historic Lake View Cemetery. We were interring his urn together with his wife’s cremains on what would have been their 67th wedding anniversary.

I might even have blinked back a tear or two when the military honor guard stepped forward to present the flag to the honoree’s great grandson.

A Tapestry of Love. 

Hold these things together in your sight—purple, crimson, magenta, blue. You will be feasting on this long after the flowers are gone.”
Lynn Ungar, excerpted from “Flower Communion”

This was one of those days that I harbored hope for such a thing as an afterlife cinema lounge ~ where our dearly departed ones get to hang out with a fancy drink in hand featuring all the accoutrements like a maraschino cherry and fancy umbrella, and so they can sneak a peek at their left-behinders. And that’s because if this Great Grandma woulda coulda been able to see her paintings, cross-stitch, art and craft supplies, gardening tools, and 28 quilts & cherished fabrics on display, her heavenly heart would surely have skipped a beat.

She was busy in the days and hours before she died stitching quilts for two of her great-grandchildren who are months away from being born. And in the museum of her last day, there was a third quilt for a dreamed-of future great-grandchild. This quilt was displayed on the altar table, as yet unfinished and with the needle and thread still piercing it.

Our Lady, Queen of Quilts and Quips was fêted in all the ways. Her daughter crafted her mom’s infamous coffee, creamer, sugar, and faux-Kahlua drink at the altar as she shared her words of tribute but could only manage a tiny sip of it because it was less than lovely.

Her family created a bouquet of remembrance from an array of flowers as a commemorative ritual. They affirmed all the ways they would remember her, ranging from visits to Walmart to doing laundry to watching Nascar. And as closing gesture after my final words by the Japanese poet Basho that when “the temple bell stops, the sound keeps coming out of the flowers,” we held a moment of silence so her daughter could extinguish the floral candle on the altar and ceremoniously ring her Mom’s coveted glass windchime.

Everyone took home a wildflower seed packet wrapped with the satin ribbon this gardening grandma had by the truckload in her quilting supply stash, with a promise they would plant flowers in her honor. An added bonus to the day was that I was finally able to use the vintage brass birdcage stand I was given years ago that I’d yet to find a use for. Turns out, I was saving it all this time so we could hang a windchime from it that afternoon.

And that’s how life goes. Past, Present, and Future all hanging out together at a funeral and being the first ones to walk out of the room, swaying ever so slightly in time as Nat and Natalie sing “Unforgettable.”

The Energy of it All.

At this memorable fall-season service, I wove in time for us to room”-inate in meditative reflection, in order to intentionally release some of these agitating energies, as well as to renew and lean in deeper to love and gratitude through the process of considering their cherished memories and moments with their beloved one. We did so with amethyst and rose quartz stones in hand, which were two of the honoree’s favorite crystals.

Divining positive ju-ju in the fresh days after death, if even for an hour, is not always possible. I’ve worked with more than a few angry next of kin. One unforgettable widow was so explosively mad and up and in her grief during my family meeting with her in her home a few years back that I almost felt the need for a bodyguard. And a shower. Such are the perils of being a last/first responder. Little wonder that people often comment, “I don’t know how you do this work.” On days like that, I don’t either.

There but by the grace of unknowing and ambiguity go we. We bumble along this path knowing that energy will come out sideways occasionally or that things will sometimes mess up. We watch the left behinders struggle to orchestrate perfection as a way to control something/anything in these days and weeks after Death courted their loved one and took them away.

And we harvest gleanings of insight and moments of loveliness. For me, those moments of poignancy were listening to Melanie DeMore sing “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” as the woman’s son was placed to rest at a graveside service held just days after this one, while watching this sweet Mama’s shoulders shake and tremble and hold all her grief. (The things our bodies carry for us.) Or at this rose quartz service, watching all 100 people walk in quiet procession behind the hearse as they wove their way along the roadways to the backside of the cemetery.

And then alas, after all the warmth of vigiling, comes the weariness, as the mourners trudge ever on, carrying their memories and tattered remnants from the realm of what was forward into the realm of what will be. And in those moments, where it’s just me and the litany of flowers remaining to take in the silence and the serenity, I sweep up the ethereal crumbs of all that whipped-up energy so that it flows its way back into earth and floats back up to sky.

Company of Friends.

“When I die let them judge me
by my company of friends
Let them laugh for all the laughter
Let them cry for laughter’s end…
When I die, let them toast to
all the things that I believe
Let them raise a glass to consciousness
Let their tongues get light as thieves”
Danny Schmidt, “Company of Friends”

I’d mostly been doing in-person or hybrid Celebrations of Life throughout 2021 but given that we pivoted back to virtual ceremonies for a time, I agreed to take on a virtual memorial because I was smitten with the honoree’s life story. And I was enamored with how many lifelong friends showed up to honor him with visual, spoken word, musical, and eulogy tributes. And that’s how it goes. Just as we fall in love with our wedding couples, we celebrants fall in love with the dearly departed ones as we’re tasked with the honor of putting flesh to bones, so to speak, and bring their lived experiences roaring back to life via story, gesture + elegiac note, if only for an hour or so.

To lend nod to his love of photography, I included a gallery view element in the program for everyone to hold a cherished symbol, essence word, or favorite pic of his to the screen. It was a choose your own adventure moment (I chose to hold up the word plaque “Brilliantly Unique”) as we listened to an instrumental rendition of “See You Again,” a song that is to funerals as “A Thousand Years” is to weddings. It was a rich, full program that ended with all of us raising a glass to consciousness as a longtime happy hour buddy led us in a toast to his friend in the great beyond. I chose a glass of Baileys but many of his friends chose tequila or beer. 

What would your memorial toast signature poison be?

The Myth of Glorification.

One of the myths I’m eager to dispel in my work as a funeral celebrant is what I call the Myth of Glorification.

It’s that tendency we have to want to gloss over all the challenges, character flaws, relationship strife, and unpleasant circumstances of our person’s life and instead, paint a rosy picture as though we’re preparing to induct them into sainthood. Just as we don’t need to wholesale trash a person’s character (unless we do and that’s another topic entirely), we also don’t need to sugarcoat and tie a lovely ribbon around how they lived happily ever after with nary an issue.

It’s a tricky balance and honestly, I attract lots of families who aren’t up for the task of truth-telling, especially when all the tricky stuff has long been swept under a family carpet. When a family is willing to weave in transparency, however, it allows everyone to make eye contact with and say yo, wassup to the elephant in the room, so to speak. And something special happens when they do; some imperceptible shift from that place of pretend to the realm of, if not straight-up authenticity, then something close to it.

Those elephants are invariably trauma-centered. They range from addiction to abuse to mental illness, to family feuds and severance, to the circumstances of the death itself. A big reason I’m a funeral celebrant today stems from attending my 17-year-old niece’s funeral 12 years ago. Her death by suicide was never mentioned. I’ve never forgotten how hollow that hour felt and how everyone held their breath because it didn’t even feel like a safe space to grieve. And while not all the family secrets and dirty laundry needs to be aired when we honor our dearly departed ones, having the courage to allude to these things can go a long way towards fostering acceptance and healing.

In my planning conversations with this honoree’s sister, I asked her about his life challenges and character traits associated with these challenges. She acknowledged her lifelong relationship rift with her brother, together with his struggles with homelessness, gambling, and other questionable activities of the o’dark thirty variety. “We barely saw each other as adults even though we lived close to each other. He had every opportunity in life and he squandered it all. And I never approved of his life choices,” she admitted before asking, “how do we keep it real without making him look bad?” 

I cautioned her that while I wouldn’t be looking to dwell on those details, I would touch on them and with her blessing, I would language things in such a way that would allow people to understand how grieving his mother’s death and his push/pull need for attention and connection over the years led him to make some less than ideal life choices.

As I uttered these touchpoints of his life aloud during his service, people read between the lines and they nodded their heads. They knew him and they knew that these were the truths of this man’s life. I spoke matter-of-factly about his many ups and downs, weaving in the lyrics from Frank Sinatra’s “That’s Life,” (which was the song we closed with), to note how he truly had been a “a puppet, a pauper, a pirate, a poet, a pawn, and a king” but that no matter what, he never stopped answering the door whenever opportunity knocked. And I noted how so many are only one mortgage payment away from hardship as a way to talk about his journey from homeowner to homelessness.

Before the memorial, his sister shared with me that seeing my draft copy of the ceremony was the permission she needed in order to write her own honest tribute. When it came time for her to eulogize him, she bravely and tearfully spoke the truth of their relationship. “Unlike a lot of siblings, my brother and I were not always close. He was 10 years older than me. We had different lives,” she revealed before adding, “but that doesn’t mean we didn’t have moments.” From that tender admission, she was able to focus on the couple of connection points they enjoyed – a shared love of music back in the day, and a heartfelt dinner conversation a few years ago that brought her a slim measure of forgiveness.

We don’t always get to tell big truths at funerals, it’s true, but when we do, we set a permissive tone and crack a door open for others during the ceremony. During this man’s memorial, this deliberate but delicate thread of honesty stitched an opening for family, friends, and co-workers to get up and share from the heart. Many echoed sentiments from both of our tribute words that rang true for them. One cousin affirmed that she was one of the many family members I mentioned, who took him in when no one else would. And another old friend admitted that he, too, could relate to being one mortgage payment away from losing it all.

The elephants had been spoken of and people felt safe at this service being able to name some difficult things.

So long story longer, this being human is a messy, imperfect, and complex affair. Let’s not pretend otherwise, especially during a pandemic, and most notably when we gather together in intimate community to honor our newly dead.

Putting the Fun in Funerals.

Here are a few funeral hacks from an afternoon inurnment service that are good reminders for all of us to store away (minus those of us choosing greener pastures).

1) Bring a Polaroid Camera. And then before, during, or after the service – choose your own adventure, people – gather your loved ones (who you may find yourself loving just a tiny bit more in a moment where you’re feeling all the feels). Once the photo has developed (sung to the tune of Shake it like a Polaroid Picture), place said pic atop the casket, in the grave, or in the case of an inurnment, into the vault before closing.

2) Make Impromptu Music. We could have sung “Row Your Boat” to this Navy man, but instead, at the end and in lieu of formal military honors, I offered a naval two-bell ritual and afterwards, a family member grabbed the honoree’s harmonica from the memorial table and with a cigarette in one hand and the harmonica to her lips in the other, she proceeded played Taps as the perfect farewell salute.

3) Bring Small Meaningful Mementos to place in or with the Urn. As ode to his love of fishing and woodworking, I invited family members to tuck a fishing lure in with the urn together with a mini woodpecker carving that he was famous for gifting everyone.

4) Make the Memorial Table Memorable. The lucky pink fishing poles, wooden jewelry boxes, Halibut photo, USS Missouri model, and photos on display figured prominently in the stories we shared. Showcasing these treasures allowed everyone to see and hear his life story anew through the lenses of their grieving and grateful hearts.

Notes from the Cryptside. 

This tale from the cryptside was brought to being by the skies turning blue just as the intimate ceremony ended. It guest-starred the perfectly sequenced postlude playlist – from Olivia Newton-John to Ozzy to Bocelli to Neil Diamond – which would serendipitously transition songs in tandem with each closing gesture by the cemeterians. And it was sponsored by Starbucks and Nordstrom, the two fave locales of the lovely matriarch we celebrated. Her daughters had this to say the next day: 

Thank you so much for crafting such a beautiful service & helping us through this difficult time. We keep thinking of yesterday’s ceremony & it seemed just right for our mom and what she would have wanted. You spoke about our mom as if you knew her, & everything was so thoughtful & personal. You were perfect for us & we are so grateful you were the person to do it – you captured her spirit so well! All of your suggestions, readings, & words were perfect & although we’re still very sad, we now have a more peaceful/calm feeling from the closure of yesterday. We appreciate all your hard work.”

And even as there is no official “closure” to grief, I do know that the more we can co-weave the right tone – be that simple and intimate, loudly lighthearted, or whatever, together with thoughtful gestures, stories, symbols, music, and personalized touches into a ceremony, the more it lends that feeling of having “done right by” our loved ones.  

Hooked on a Feeling.

The best I can hope for in those first minutes after officiating a Celebration of Life is not the tears and laughter, family hugs and words of appreciation and/or awe by attendees who felt moved and inspired by what they witnessed and experienced, although those are indeed the morsels that feed us funeral celebrants for days. 

The best I can hope for is that the ceremony might proffer reconciliation and healing for attendees who are estranged from other family members in the room. I invite the work of it every time at the end of my funerals by sending people back out into the world to love, love, love on their people and to forgive those they need to get busy forgiving.

Such was the case at this service for an avid fisherman, classic hot rod buff, fun-loving prankster, and devoted Papa.

Ten minutes after the ceremony, a couple of these famously feuding family members made amends with one another. There were tears in the eyes of all the loved ones who witnessed the moment.

It was a good day at the office.

Wind Song.

 

He said he believed in life after death. The proof would be his haunting the landscape here. I would see him in the shifting breath of wind when a storm blew in from the cape, the flash of bittersweet light at dawn, The time he loved best, or in a wren’s song. I would see and hear my brother’s own life linger in mine, and look for him in long drawn-out moments before the tide turns, or in winter rains that never seem to end.”
excerpted from “Afterlife” by Floyd Skloot

Sometimes there are ceremonies that we funeral celebrants get to witness & receive as though we, too, are amongst the mourners. Getting to pay tribute to and truth-tell the brave life tale of a Sioux Lakota Hunkpapa tribal elder for this inurnment ceremony was an honor. And getting to bear witness to the smudging, drumming and chanting rituals enacted by his brother, his young nephew, and his friends was such good medicine for all present. The winds blew the sage smoke due south in my direction, like a welcome reconsecration for this ceremonialist.

Minutes later, these same winds carried our Salish Sea winged friend, the heron, who flew by just as this man’s sobbing brother placed the smudging feather in the niche as last gesture and looked up to the sky to declare that he would one day again see his brother at home in the sky.

The family and I traded ceremony photos by text when we got home and it turns out eagles circled overhead both of our houses when we returned home, which was quite a moment of synchronicity but not at all surprising to either of us. We had begun the day with a promise and a pact to one another. “Let us be ever watchful for eagles today.”

It was a fitting ending as I thought to myself, sigh, there he is...a newbie soul across the veil on the flipside but already haunting the landscape here.

I thanked the snow gods that they kept the storm at bay for a day so we could celebrate the life and magic of a true Renaissance soul one winter day through stories, the live musicianship of a local classical guitarist, a video tribute, plenty of memorial table artifacts, and a luncheon to follow.

 

This service had marked the first week Washington State had allowed families to gather again for a physically-distanced catered gathering. It did my heart good to see families be able to take a moment to gather safely and connect after the ceremony.

 

His wife got busy cutting up one of his beloved Eddie Bauer flannel shirts the week prior (he was a longtime employee) in order to create cloth pouches for the laminated bookmarks of his artwork that she’d made. She also tucked gemstone hearts into each of them as a nod to his vast antique marble, gemstone, and mineral collection. This creative man was an avid collector of many other things, too – from vintage British motorcycles and sports cars to muzzleloader paraphernalia, to guitars, to the geodes we featured in a remembrance ritual as the professional guitarist played “Scarborough Fair.”

 

A few attendees came up afterwards to comment that I spoke about him as though I had known him all my life. That’s the not-so-secret intention of every funeral celebrant I know – that we honor the dearly departed one in a way that feels intimate and as though we, too, have been interwoven into the fabric of the family forever.

 

It was an honor to construct a ceremony for such a “Gem of the Earth” guy wherein we could float him out on a songline and in noteworthy fashion with all his favorite music, people, treasures, and stories. The last lines of the poem noted above are: Who will do it again? That’s it: no one; / imitators and descendants aren’t the same.”

And that, right there, is why I do what I do. Because each and every life is unique and unrepeatable and deserves to be celebrated as such.

The Stuff of Sorrow.

The heart, like the mind, has a memory. And in it are kept the most precious keepsakes.”

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Sometimes it’s nice to present friends and family with an item as they walk into the memorial service so they can have it in hand throughout the ceremony. A recent example was for a beach-loving, shell-collecting matriarch.

During my father’s Celebration of Life, I placed a thread upon each chair and early on in the ceremony, read a poem called “The Way it Is” by William Stafford that speaks to the thread we follow in life. I invited those attending to consider their own life thread before then going on to talk about the connective strand and theme of Dad’s life story.

Tender Teachings.

“Scatter my ashes in my garden so I can be near my loves. Say a few honest words, sing a gentle song, join hands in a circle of flesh.”
~ excerpted from “Post Humus” by Patti Tana

We didn’t hold hands at this backyard memorial, but we did wear masks and many of us wore a hint of pink as nod to the honoree’s favorite color. And there were lots of tears and honest words shared about the perpetual lateness of a beloved mother, sister, aunt, friend, and teacher. In fact, we started the ceremony a few minutes late in her honor. 

Watching two of her sweet young grandsons read from Warren Hanson’s The Next Place was heart-wrenching. And yet it’s a memory that will stay with them. The afternoon of tribute sharing closed with her kindreds stepping forward to scatter a portion of her ashes from a tiny keepsake urn. Close family members read their favorite lasting impressions of her from pink slips as they placed pastel roses at the base of the freshly planted flowering plum tree next to the new memorial bench that was handcrafted by a relative.

I found myself smiling as I attempted to speak over the chorus of frogs and squawking crows who had joined us for our closing ritual. And I marveled at the moment, earlier in the program, when her twin sister lit the twin flame candles on the altar of their large covered back deck, just as we began to play k.d. lang’s rendition of “Hallelujah.” There was not a breeze to be had that afternoon, but as k.d. sang rumors of Cohen’s secret chord and family were quietly crying (and I was doing my level best not to do the same), a wind from somewhere way, way elsewhere began to billow through the pink altar cloth like a space between the sad notes or maybe even an ethereal wave.

Which is how we returned the gesture at the end, with a final sigh and a nod and the old-time fiddle sounds of Hank Williams Sr. singing “I’ll Fly Away.” A month prior, I had invited the grieving daughter to consider collecting stories of her mother as a keepsake legacy for her three boys. The result was a gorgeous large album of poignant letters ~ from fellow elementary school teachers, friends, and family ~ that will become a family treasure for these grandsons and their own one day, someday children.

Trees and stories and letters and heirlooms and favorite colors and songs are just six of the countless ways I know to keep living on eternally in the hearts and minds of our beloveds. And as it turns out, singing frogs, rowdy birds, and blowing wind are three more.

Distant Memories.

A Sunny Farewell.

It was my great honor to officiate this graveside interment ceremony for a much-loved husband, father, friend, and all-around good guy. The blue sky and sunny afternoon – his fave – was custom-ordered and delivered on time by the weather gods, as requested.

 

We saw evidence that our honoree may have been leaning in listening from the other side when the eagle chose the precise moment we closed the grave to tip a wing and do a fly-by.

 

And what could be better than having his son-in-law sing him home with “One More Day,” “Amazing Grace,” and “Landslide” by Fleetwood Mac as Mt. Rainier bore majestic witness? There was not a dry eye in attendance.

And right on time or even a bit ahead of schedule (because they’re Canadian), the flock of geese did a fly-over and sung invocation to start things off on just the right elegaic note.

And thus began this memorable graveside memorial for a beloved matriarch, who preserved every greeting card and craft project from her kids and grandkids, like timeless paper treasures. And that her next of kin should intuit that treasures also live timelessly in moments such as when the winds conspired mid-ceremony to then sing her home alongside Melanie DeMore’s rendition of “Swing Low.”

Look for the brightest colors, sun sparkling on the lake, the sea, or turning rain drops into daily diamonds. Listen to the stories the old trees tell in hushing voices, the rushing sounds of ocean waves – “

—Silvia Hartmann, from “Poem for an Artist”

 

When a memorial is so exquisitely arranged ~ from the perfect location, to an abundance of flowers and candles, to keepsake glass stones with her painting images affixed to them, to just-right program booklets, to an array of memorial display tables, to the exquisite rendition of Amazing Grace on sax (one of her last requests), to a well-crafted photo tribute, to perfect readings and poignant ritual gestures, to a lovely luncheon thereafter — it’s not uncommon to overhear, “Oh, (the honoree) would have loved this!”

 

If I had a hundred dollars for each time I heard her friends and family exclaim that on Saturday, I would have enough socked away for a mighty fine vacay. And indeed, everything was so perfectly curated to suit this artist’s aesthetic, from the 1915 chapel to the pastoral landscape to having dozens of her paintings on display for friends and family to take home after. There’s no doubt she would have adored it.

 

And so, I have that conversation with people in those moments. That we CAN and ought to do this same thing as a living tribute for our loved ones. We don’t need to wait. A milestone birthday or a midsummer or fall season Saturday is a lovely time to host a reunion of loved ones for the sole/soul purpose of celebrating a parent, a grandparent, a cherished aunt.

 

What can that look like on a DIY basis? Collect sentiments, via email, video clips via tribute.co, or even on the day of the event, if need be. Elect someone to play MC and dedicate a half hour in the day’s programming to honor that relative with stories and memories, photos, memorabilia, and a feature display table. Everyone contributes written notes expressing what they most love about this person as they arrive. Someone could be present at the welcome table with a laptop, capturing those words in a keepsake document and voila, they have both a basket of notes and a typed record of all the love.

In the case of this cherished matriarch, she could have been humorously presented with a box of Hamburger Helper and been present to hear the stories that while her cooking skills were what they were, that was OK. And she could have gotten to hear Amazing Grace on the saxophone herself, which was her only “last request” for the service.

 

A living tribute celebration doesn’t need to look or act funeral-ish. It can honestly be a showcase hour within a family gathering in which the elder honoree gets to take the spotlight and have gifts and words and love bestowed upon them.

 

Or better yet, have each family contribute funds to outsourcing this piece to a professional aka we friendly neighborhood celebrant types for whom this work comes ridiculously easy. It’s what we do with all our tribute ceremony work. We work in consultation with as many family members as we need to in order to pull those stories and sentiments together in the form of a cohesive, creative and poignant hour filled with multi-sensory touches, story, laughter, and connection.

 

But my point is, let’s not wait. And let’s not let those family reunion plans slide. We need to start getting these gatherings on the books and carving moments in these events to honor not just the youngest and cutest in the clan but the oldest VIPs in our family.

 

We don’t know how many more revolutions around the sun that our older generation of folks will get – or heck, any of us, for that matter. And so imagine the gift to them of being able to be present and commemorated for their life contributions with words and gestures we might typically reserve for celebrations of life after they’re gone.

 

Imagine getting to hear them say, “I love this – this is so me and I’m so honored to be celebrated by my family in this way!”

 

I mean, really…why aren’t we doing this more?

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I always feature a framed photo of the decedent upon my desk, keep a candle lit as I write, and call their spirit near as an invocation to my work, to help guide me in illuminating their story. Some might call this woo and there was probably a time not so long ago when I might have done that, as well, but too many mysterious moments have transpired in this work now for me to dismiss or explain away what truly is numinous.

 

Like that one Wednesday evening in the midnight hour, as I began writing an 11th hour graveside service, and the candle smoke suddenly shaped itself into a heart. Many of my colleagues are fond of exclaiming of their wedding celebrancy work how much they love this work we get to do, but honestly, nothing beats these funeral celebrant moments where mysterious hearts shape themselves from flame, as though to remind me that this solitary and intensive vocation really is a loving and sacred homage.

 

Blessedly, this wise patriarch had crafted his own 16-page life story some years earlier, which made my job in the days prior to his graveside service decidedly easier. Under the canopy of a sunny Seattle sky, we honored the singular gift of his 31,924-day lifespan with music, prayer, story, and military honors for his Korean War service. As a penultimate gesture, his first-born son, a staunch Huskies fan, placed a Zags (Gonzaga U) hat upon his father’s casket, as nod to his father’s rival alma mater and fierce love for all things sports-related.

 

The family then vigiled for a final dove release moment, and as the dozen white birds took flight upon a wing and a prayer into those busy Friday afternoon SeaTac airways at the precise moment an Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 took off, no less (he worked for Boeing for 36 years), these homing birds and all of us who bore witness to them were serenaded with the Vitamin String Quartet rendition of “Sweet Home Alabama,” as befitting a song as any for this humble southern gentleman with deep rural Alabama roots.

 

Unbeknownst to the family, just as their vehicle procession arrived at the graveside, a rabbit had hopped into view and made his way to greet the hearse in tandem with the burial ground custodians and honor guard representatives walking to do the same.

 

I wholesale adore when the natural and human world conspire to add beauty and synchronicity in outdoor ceremonies and yes, it’s true: I am smitten with this end-of-life work.

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I infused a heart theme element throughout – from the crystal heart stones friends and family held in hand at the beginning and end of the ceremony for ritual purposes, to the uttering aloud of how many heartbeats this precious boy knew from inception to delivery (51 million+), to the satin hearts everyone wrote blessings upon in order to tuck inside a comfort teddy bear (that the family would later have filled at their local Build-a-Bear workshop), to what it means to cohere hearts in communal grief and love with the family, to the notion of the endless melody that lingers on in our hearts, to quote Viktor Frankl.

 

And yes, this work is not easy. I do all I can to release my own tears before and after ceremonies of this kind so I can hold space and be fully present for the family in their time of need. I practice reading the ceremony aloud and take special care to work on the places where my voice catches and the words slay me, even as there is no rehearsing my response when both parents choose to be the ones to share readings and tribute words in the ceremony. This mom shared how touched she was by the grace of those who delivered food and showed up to plant a memorial tree and tend their garden. “God is the Grubhub delivery guy” and “the team of gardeners who show up so you can be left to mourn the death of your stillbirth son,” she revealed.

 

During my drive to the ceremony space, I played Sarah McLachlan’s “Prayer of St. Francis” as a way to: (a) bawl my eyes out; and (b) remind myself that in my role of celebrant, I am an instrument, a vessel, a hollow reed. And, of course, I’m human and an empath, at that, and so not always hollow enough. And I’m a mother who has known her own stillbirth loss.

 

My voice did catch ever so slightly….in the heartbreaking spot in the ceremony where I named death at the still moment of birth. Japanese Zen master Kozan Ichikyo says it best when he professes that, “Empty handed I entered the world / Barefoot I leave it. / My coming, my going / Two simple happenings that got entangled.”

 

If only such happenings were simple but of course, they are anything but. Yet ceremony does so much to help us to navigate the complexity with gesture and great humility. We need to trust in it more….it always delivers (except when it doesn’t – see sentence 2).

It would have been so much easier for this family to carry this monumental loss privately but their willingness to admit that they needed their community to bear witness to their pain and grief was affirming and ultimately, aids them enormously in these early days of their grief journey, as they navigate how and when they must ask for and be open to support.

 

I am constantly surprised by grown adults who approach me after funerals to admit that this was their first memorial, as was the case with one woman that day. The pianist and I took a moment to speak to her of where and how a personalized celebrant service differs from many memorials, where the family’s needs are not centered or held. I’m heartened to know that this ceremony, as gut-wrenching as it was, is the one that will set the standard for her of how a funeral should look and feel.

 

As time goes on over the years, I am getting better and better at constructing my own reconsecration rituals that help me release these dearly departed ones who come to me so I can honor their essence and tell their story. To be continued.

 

And the truth is, I carry them in my heart always.

Hops & Pops & Poppy Seeds

 

The hour was filled with lots of tears, laughter, nostalgic visuals, story sharing, and meaningful gestures like a flag folding ritual, a personalized litany of remembrance + collaborative wreath decorating, singing of Row Your Boat (shout-out to funeral celebrant colleague extraordinaire Dina Stander who gifted me this idea!), paired with a closing toast where we all cracked open our cans of Bud Light as a kind of sociable concerto and nod to his love of cheap beer, followed by a final two-bell ritual.

Of Revolution and Germination.

The occupational upside to crafting bespoken ceremonies is that in the rare event of illness, I can hand the transcript to someone else to play celebrant, as needed.

This was the case in the days before Christmas 2017, when the flu rendered me bedridden. Luckily, the commemorative memorial was a cohort of closest family and friends, gathering for the first time six months after Briar died to share stories with her father who lived in Atlantic Canada and had not been back since just prior to her Briar’s death.

One of Briar’s closest friends, Katrina, agreed to take the script and host the space that day. Katrina and I had met a year and half prior during a Final Passages death doula class. At the end of the intensive weekend of training, Jerrigrace cautioned us that one of us would be leaving the room and would be called to utilize the skills learned in companionship with a loved one. We couldn’t know at the time that this someone would turn out to be Katrina, whose friend Briar was soon after diagnosed with cancer.

When Katrina and I bumped into each other at the Death Salon event in Seattle in fall of 2017, she shared an update about how, when Briar had died months prior at the end of June, she had agreed to be the first human to donate her body to be recomposed as part of a new and alternative mode of disposition at Washington State University. Katrina had turned Briar on to this possibility and Briar, being a nature-oriented artist, loved the idea.

Katrina admitted to me that apart from their bedside vigil with her in the days before and after Briar’s death, and the performative water ballet/aqua follies-style flash mob, “Ankle Deep,” which her friends had all enacted for Briar that summer in the Volunteer Park wading pool at Briar’s request, they had yet to gather to communally grieve as a group. I nudged Katrina to consider marking the time prior to Briar’s final disposition ceremoniously. And so we began to work together to make that happen.

Briar’s father was arriving in the days around the winter solstice and so in mid-December, Katrina and I set to work co-crafting a commemorative vigil that would do justice to Briar’s creative spark, and that would more importantly, allow him ample time and the cathartic space to hear stories from her closest friends who were, in essence, her Pacific Northwest family.

At one point in the planning, we had even conceived of doing something with water ballet Barbies (as nod to the chandelier, pictured here, that Briar created, which later inspired the water ballet performance). But alas, there was plenty to work with from the readings and rituals I had already proposed.

Briar was wildly creative and that showed up in the nature-based community art installations she made. To honor this, I suggested that as this intimate group of friends sat in circle with Briar’s father, that they collaboratively construct an earth altar comprised of early foragings from her island property.

This opening reading proved ideal for honoring Briar’s earth-centered choices in both life and in death.

Sand: crystalline children of dead mountains.
Little quartz worlds rubbed by the wind.
Compost: rich as memory,
Sediment of our pleasures,
orange rinds and roses and beef bones,
Coffee and cork and dead lettuce,
Trimmings of hair and lawn.
I marry you, I marry you.
in your mingling under my grubby nails
I touch the seeds of what will be.
Revolution and germination are mysteries of birth
without which Many
are born to starve.

I am kneeling and planting,
I am making fertile.
I am putting some of myself
back in the soil.
Soon enough, sweet black mother of our food!,
you will have the rest.
Marge Piercy, “Kneeling Here, I Feel Good”

A good part of their afternoon together was spent sharing stories, amidst both laughter and tears, of Briar’s unique essence and gifts. As one person shared cherished memories, others would take turns placing items upon the altar mandala they were all co-creating in Briar’s honor. 

As a closing ritual, everyone placed a flower and organically shared personalized remembrance litanies that spoke to all the various sensory reminders that would have them remembering Briar.

Ever the ground-breaker, Briar was among the first six to donate their body to Recompose to test the possibilities and modalities for human recomposition. The results were successful and subsequently, a bill was brought forth in January 2019 Washington State legislature to legalize human decomposition as a redisposition method.

Now that Recompose is officially operational, yet another litany of remembrance has been added to the list of things that have us thinking of Briar. For in both life creed and final bodily deed ~ and her place in helping pioneer a revolutionary new mode of final disposition, we will remember her.

The Many and the One.

We are all just a car crash, a diagnosis, an unexpected phone call,
a newfound love, or a broken heart away
from becoming a completely different person.
How beautifully fragile are we that so many things
can take but a moment to alter who we are for forever?”
— Samuel Decker Thompson

It’s difficult, as a funeral celebrant, to get the call. In all circumstances, it means death has arrived for those on the other end of the phone and as a kind of first responder in this time of grief, we are the ones tasked with engaging in this courageous conversation, holding the space, and bearing compassionate witness.

When people hear what I do, their initial reaction is invariably, “I don’t know how you do it! I could honestly never be there for families in a time of such fresh grief.” For all of us who have been in the family’s shoes, we know what it is to need someone, anyone, to help us navigate this unknown terrain. Shock, anger, confusion, grief – the constellation of feelings grieving families grapple with is daunting.

This was true for the family and friends who received the news that their beloved had been struck by a car while out jogging with a friend on Father’s Day. He was airlifted to the hospital and died the next morning. 

Blessedly, the family took the necessary time after his death and didn’t rush into holding a Celebration of Life until two months later. Chris had three families and a cohort of colleagues at the University of Washington, so having the time to pull together their stories helped in illuminating the unique essence of this bright soul. He was a man with three sets of parents, nine siblings, and four families so as you can imagine, his Celebration of Life held many stories which together, wove a tapestry of his love for deep relationship connections and experiences, home improvement, motion juxtaposed with stillness, the pursuit of knowledge, the art of a race, and the thrill of a marathon finish line.

He touched many lives and this fact was evidenced not only by the standing-room-only crowd in the conference hall, but by how many friends and family stepped up to help. From the crew who trimmed the Gerber daisy stems, filled the chemistry beaker bottle vases for the tables and set LED strand lights on the tables as visual tribute to things he loved, to those who helped put together program booklets, to the photo and video tribute creations, to the ones who eulogized him; the immense love for this man was obvious.

I theme every ceremony I craft and as such, settled upon “Tread Lightly” for his, which honored the ways Chris showed up for others, to quote Rumi, as “a lamp, a lifeboat, or a ladder.” This theme also spoke, not only to his obvious love of running and cycling, but more importantly to how his footprint and lasting impression was one of being a gentle and kind spirit who cared deeply for our One earth and her Many inhabitants.

I think of his father’s closing words, bidding his son to, “run now on the wind…we will lace up our shoes and try to keep you in sight” – which is an apt metaphor for the journey grievers then embark upon to hold onto memories and images of their dearly departed loved one.

To close his ceremony, I adapted words from Aaron Freeman’s “Eulogy from a Physicist” to have everyone consider how all his “energy, every vibration, every Btu of heat, every wave of every particle” that was Chris remains with us still in the world. And while this brings small comfort in a time of monumental loss, it does speak to how in life, as in death, mystery is truly all-pervasive.

As with all those whose lives I have had the deep honor to commemorate, I wish I could have known Chris and experienced his indelible light while he was alive.

A Wing and a Prayer.

And then a butterfly floated by.

That was the six-word epitaph of a butterfly-themed graveside service I crafted for a friend’s mother, whose urn they had plans to inter at her small-town cemetery this past August.

We both hail from the same hometown (Edmonton) in Alberta so it was a change of sorts and yet natural for me to weave her mother’s story while having a strong familiarity with all her life’s migrations and favorite locales across Western Canada. Her land was my land, too.

In the early days of working with families, not only do I capture life tribute elements, but I also seek symbols that reflect their interests, collections, and essential life spirit. Elizabeth was an avid collector of Inuit art such as soapstone carvings, as well as an assortment of other beautiful things. One such object of beauty for her was butterflies.

When families hire me, they are unknowingly offered a treasure trove of suggestions for rituals, readings and funeral tokens, should they so desire them. Alas, my friends expect such options to be par for the ceremonial course with me.

Loretta wanted to include something butterfly-related as a giveaway item at the end and so I provided her a solid list of options, courtesy of my friend Amazon, for the three dozen or so family members who would be attending the service. And then because she’s my pal, she received the added benefit of me helping her print, laminate, and grommet the funeral cards as well as attach the silk satchels with assorted lattice butterflies inside. They proved to be an inexpensive yet gorgeous commemorative item for attendees to take home. And more to the point, they were the perfect capstone visual to the hour spent honoring Elizabeth’s appreciative nature, her love of gardening, and her own metamorphosis from life into death.

Elizabeth had died the November prior and so, as is the case in northern locales, the frozen ground made it all but impossible to consider interring her until spring thaw. Waiting until late summer allowed the family the necessary time to grieve, deal with all the other affairs that needed attending to, and to get clarity on how they might like to honor her memory.

As with many families, such clarity was not cohesive. And so Loretta hired me on the sly because she was adamant that even though a Pentecostal minister would be conducting the graveside service, she wanted her mom’s ceremony to be personalized,  artisanal, and well…beautiful.

And so it was. She commissioned my nephew in Edmonton to lend his pyrography skills to a temporary grave marker, as she was impressed with what he did for my brother’s service two years prior (scroll down for pictures of that).

There was music and lots of it, including a sung invocation that played at the beginning and the bagpipe rendition of Amazing Grace, which played as the urn was lowered and nature items from her family farm and her beloved crabapple tree in Edmonton were sprinkled by all present upon the open grave. Elizabeth’s granddaughter also sang Abide With Me  as an interlude hymn, and all were led in singing an adapted lyrics rendition of Country Roads at the end of the service, to honor how those very country roads took Elizabeth home so many times over the decade. And how they would become the same roads that led her on her final human journey home to rest, nestled next to her husband and their two beloved dogs’ urn, and near to her parent’s graves in the town cemetery.

Loretta’s husband delivered the eulogy which helped tell Elizabeth’s enigmatic life tale. We don’t always know everything there is to know about our parents’ life stories. We think we do but often there are gaps, detours, difficult choices, and even secrets.

Elizabeth’s life held all of the above, and yet it also contained clear turning points, moments when one could see through the lens of posterity, how resilience, love, grace and beauty won out in the end…if that timely butterfly benediction was any indication.

Her Name Was Lola.

And she truly was a showgirl. Her nicknames were Lolly aka Princess Naughty Lola aka Desert Cat, and as the story goes, it can never be rightfully determined who adopted who. It was a 17-year love affair that took a turn for the tragic when Lola took ill and died at home in Doha, Qatar while her beloved human companion was travelling overseas on an extended vacation.

Lola’s Mom was beyond heartbroken to return home to an empty apartment. She was unsure how to choose a suitable method of final disposition because pet crematoriums in Doha are handled communally, which meant she would not be guaranteed Lola’s cremains. She knew she wanted to honor Lola with ritual and her preference was a sky burial, but she didn’t know how to pull this off, given that fires in the desert with the high winds would be extremely risky. So via email and Facebook messaging, the two of us conceived of how she could spend time with Lola with healing ritual in that day and hours before she intended to take Lola out to the desert, and how she could then go about then burying her.

I counseled her to find a box suitable for burial, include some lining, choose fabric to enshroud Lola with, to gather markers for decorating, and to collect Lola’s beloved things that she knew she would want to include in the makeshift cat casket. As she did this, I began crafting the ceremony and Lola’s story.

Lola’s Mom then got busy decorating the shroud with a handcrafted letter on one side of a white pillow case and symbols and words on the other. She then embellished the box with decorative elements, symbols and photos, prepping it for when she would pick Lola up from the vet’s office the next day. Having the opportunity to spend time bathing and anointing Lola with oils, and loving on her during this liminal period between death and committal is a precious grief rite few people choose to face. Lola’s Mom was up for it, even as she knew it was going to be emotionally taxing. And it was. But it was also beautiful. She was able to attend to Lola with this last rite, and place her in the box.

The next day, she drove more than an hour south of Doha to a coastal desert locale and together with her closest friends, held an uncommon committal ceremony at sunset for her bestest feline friend.

One of her friends read an excerpt from Mary Oliver’s “In Blackwater Woods” about how “to live in this world you must be able to do three things: to love what is mortal; to hold it against your bones knowing your own life depends upon it; and, when the time comes to let it go, let it go.”

Another of her friends then shared Lola’s extraordinary tale from her winter adoption in the year 2000 as a kitten, and collectively, they traveled memory lane reminiscing about Lola’s many exploits and idiosyncrasies. Here’s an excerpt:

 To tell the tale of this one kitty means tracing all the places she would go. It means telling the tale of her eight cities from Dubai to Phuket to Hong Kong to Shanghai to Hanoi to Jakarta, back to Dubai and finally to Doha. If there was such a thing as feline frequent flyer miles, Princess Lola would surely have been an Emirates Skywards Platinum member.”

 After sharing words of affirmation and committal, tears, laughs, and a personalized litany of remembrance, the ladies placed beach items they had collected into the burial box, buried Lola several feet into the sand, covered the box with sand and placed the orchid above that so that it too, could be covered with sand and buried. For the closing reading, I chose the poem “The Cat’s Song” by Marge Piercey, and then custom-crafted cat-themed words of benediction followed by a farewell toast of sparkling beverages in Lola’s honor.

She arrived home exhausted and yet, unsurprisingly, at peace knowing her fabulous feline Lola had been well feted, and that she had returned to the desert from which she was first born.

When a mother dies, a daughter grieves. And then her life moves on. She does, thankfully, feel happiness again.
But the missing her, the wanting her, the wishing she were still here ~
I will not lie to you, although you probably already know. That part never ends.” 
 Hope Edelman, Motherless Daughters: The Legacy of Loss

Food & Love.

One of the occupational laments I inherit as a funeral celebrant is that I seldom get to meet those whose life I celebrate. In the case of Virginia, a much beloved 93-year-old matriarch whose graveside burial service I officiated on a chilly winter’s day, I acutely wished I had known her in life because to know her was clearly to love her. Telling her long-life-well-lived story was awe-inspiring. As a serial volunteer and one of the founding mothers of her adopted hometown food bank, Virginia deeded her own kitchen creed in the wider community of ensuring no one went hungry.

To honor her central place in the family, community service and the underlying theme of homemaking, I suggested we close the service with Joy Harjo’s powerful poem, “Perhaps The World Ends Here.” This was apropos because following the service, all were invited to gather for a luncheon hosted by the Darrington Funeral Dinners, a community initiative that gained notoriety in the days and weeks following the Oso mudslide on March 22, 2014.

Driving home from the luncheon, I stopped at the Oso memorial shrine overlooking the mudslide disaster site that claimed 43 lives. I thought about how connected Virginia must have felt to this region and these people, and I was touched to notice the 43 trees, commemoratively adorned with Christmas ornaments. Indeed, through these honoring gestures, as with all rituals of love, loss and lament, we remember them.

 Holiday Ritual of Remembrance.

I was commissioned to craft a ritual of remembrance to honor my friend’s dear mother, who had died the previous Christmas Day. It was to be a sunset beach ceremony, given that they were vacationing in Costa Rica.

Crafting DIY healing ceremonies is one of my favorite celebrant things. I love empowering families to co-deliver their own personal ceremony and bear both private and beautiful witness to each other in this kind of formalized way.

This family really delivered. They set an amazing beach altar table, complete with many meaningful items and linens, nature items, and even holy water from Lourdes. And they were receptive to taking turns to deliver the various readings, tributes pieces and rituals, which was integral.

For one of the rituals, which I named Simple Gifts, I asked that each family member search for and gift-wrap a nature item from their vacation that held significance relative to their memories and stories of my friend’s mother. 

At that point in the ceremony, each family member took turns opening and sharing both their beach treasure and cherished memories of this dear family matriarch.

They also made exquisite use of the elements and beach environment for this ceremony. For earth, they collected black beach sand for their votive holders and river rocks on the altar. For fire, they included a burning ritual mid-ceremony and ended the day with S’mores around a bonfire. For water, they sprinkled the holy water on key ritual items, and of course, they included the ocean as they tossed their roses out to sea that next afternoon. And for air, the wind became their conduit to carry their sky lanterns onwards and upwards when the sun set that evening on the western sea.

As an annual Christmas tradition and ritual of remembrance in the years to come, my friend’s family have opted to include the wine communion element, which I had woven in as a kind of closing tribute, sacred birth honoring, and benediction.

Holiday, commemorative and grief ritual inspiration abounds. I recommend curating the meaningful treasures, linens, photos and other life ephemera, as my brave friend did, as a first step in preparing to host a remembrance ceremony to honor your dearly departed. From there, you can better visualize how to enliven their essence, story and gifts; and say your memories rite…the ceremonious way.

High Fidelity.

It was my great honor this past summer to commemorate the life of a charismatic young husband and father by the name of Tim, who died by suicide.

I’m always transparent with families from the start that should they wish to hire me as their funeral celebrant, they need to know that the reason I became a funeral celebrant was, in large part, due to witnessing my young niece Caitlin’s funeral in 2009, in which her suicide was not spoken of. It was a very tense and inauthentic service, most especially because there were no rituals or words to help facilitate the much-needed healing for family members and her high school friends alike. I’ve since vowed to be part of the good funeral movement and help facilitate transparency and healing.

Tim’s wife and family fully understood. They wanted to honor his memory authentically and wished to host a memorial service that would make space for the grief, confusion and conflicting emotions that come with such a traumatic and unexpected loss.

There are several ceremonial elements that can lend solace and help do the heavy lifting in such times of great sorrow.

One of the rituals I suggested necessitated his wife collecting river rocks from their favorite nature spot along the Cedar River. These stones were then placed on each chair. Following the eulogies, photo tribute and open remembrance, and just prior to the words of committal, everyone was invited to clasp their stone in hand, take a moment to “imprint” it with a cherished memory of Tim, and to then take that memory stone home as a keepsake.

Other keepsakes included laminated bookmarks with the “Hold Onto What is Good” poem by Nancy Wood, and my suggestion of caricature stickers designed in his likeness, which proved to be the perfect honoring of him. Tim was a consummate “tagger” and was renowned for making his mark known, as can be evidenced by how he lent color and style to his guitar. 

Some of the more poignant moments of the service were when his parents lit the life candle, when his three young children (all under age five) and wife came to the altar to place gemstones and small dinosaur toys, and when his wife and siblings extinguished the life candle at the end of the service. In both life candle moments, the family members faced the couple of hundred of attendees, and lingered just long enough for there to be a moment of intense, sacred witnessing of their collective grief.

One of my signature ways of being as a celebrant is that I name and theme every ceremony I craft. I found inspiration for Tim’s ceremony theme in his favorite movie, High Fidelity, as well as in the words of his favorite author, Chuck Palahniuk. It became obvious that Tim was a man who lived life loudly and proudly, and who exemplified an uncommon allegiance to his friends and family, and so this double entendre theme stuck.

Testament to this intimate work of close consultation with his family during the days prior to the service is that many people approached me after to remark how lovely and personalized the service was, as well as to inquire how it is that I knew Tim. When the family shared that I had never met him, these attendees confessed to being amazed at how perfectly I had managed to capture his spirit and life story.

Such is the hallmark of  my work as a Master Life-Cycle Celebrant;® illuminating the essence of those I help celebrate – through song, imagery, rituals, and story. I will forever carry Tim’s tale in my heart, and feel blessed to have lent ceremonial comfort to his family during this sorrow-filled time.

 To live in this world you must be able to do three things: to love what is mortal; to hold it against your bones knowing your own life depends on it; and, when the time comes to let it go, to let it go.”
Mary Oliver, “In Blackwater Woods”

Of Donuts & DIY Urns. 

Saying goodbye to family is heart-wrenching work, especially when those goodbyes come too soon or out of turn. When my oldest brother Tim’s health took a turn for the worse, the family quickly rallied around him. He had been on kidney dialysis for a decade and surgery was not an option for him. He made the difficult life decision to go off dialysis and spent his last couple of days with family holding vigil at his bedside. Tim passed peacefully under the lamplight of a giant harvest moon, surrounded by his loved ones.

In the days to follow, as we were making final arrangements with the funeral home, my mother and niece asked me what they should do about an urn for his cremains. Given that the burial arrangements were to be DIY, on account of his plot being located in a small town cemetery in which my Uncle acted as a volunteer sexton, there were no hard and fast rules or regulations about the type of burial urn to use. So I suggested they go to the local craft shop, purchase an inexpensive wooden chest and have my niece’s boyfriend, Sebastien, aka the family artisan, engrave or decorate the box.

As unofficial son-in-law, Seb wholeheartedly accepted the challenge and admitted after the fact that it was cathartic way to work through some of his early grief. On one side of the box, he etched a pastoral Alberta scene with wheat stalks, mountains, a harvest moon, my brother’s name and birth/death dates. On the top, he engraved my brother’s beloved tow truck and on the back side, he depicted the logos of all Tim’s favorite sporting teams. Not content to stop there, he then attached a locket, gold handles, and gold rope to the sides for the lowering. And because he’s an over-achiever, he also whipped up the wooden plaque showcased to the right, until such time as a more permanent grave marker will be placed.

The day before the graveside service, which I wrote from afar and arranged for an uncle to officiate, I encouraged my family to write notes and letters to tuck into the box, along with photos, trinkets or other mementos.

Despite the cool autumn wind, the day of the committal service proved poignant. My talented aunt and uncle lent musical tribute to the day by playing a handful of prelude, interlude and postlude hymns on the fiddle and harmonica – most notably “Amazing Grace.”

My mother shared a Mary Oliver poem, excerpted above, which perfectly befit the cemetery locale, and following the words of committal, my nephews performed the difficult task of lowering their father’s urn into the ground. Each of the immediate family members then placed an autumn rose in sync with customized litany of remembrance words I had crafted, inspired by the good work of fellow celebrant Holly Pruett. As final gesture and ode to both my brother’s infamous sweet tooth and his nickname, Timmy; the closing ritual was a Timbit (famous Canadian donut holes) benediction.

My brother was not one for ceremony, yet I sense that even he might have approved of our small ceremonial touches, and perhaps especially, the handcrafted wooden urn box.