Lisha Cassibo has been writing for the Uxbridge Cosmos for two years, both as a freelancer and as a columnist. She has also written for several parenting magazines both here in Canada and for English publications in Switzerland. She graduated from Carleton University with an honours degree in Journalism and English Literature. She lives with her family in Sunderland.
Death, a laughing matter
I got myself into a wee bit of trouble last weekend. I had fun doing it, mind you, and I really don’t see what the big deal is, but I got in trouble nonetheless.
I was at this funeral, see…
Now don’t you roll your eyes at me. I’ve seen enough rolling of the eyes to last me quite awhile, thank you. My sister-in-law at her mother. My father-in-law at his wife. My husband at me, a couple of times, but not over something I did, but over the rest of them. No tears coming out of those eyes, just lots of rolling.
My husband’s family loves funerals. All about death, they are. Christmas dinner, we talk about death. Easter – we talk about death. Summer barbeque = death. “Well, when I go…” or “When Grandma Farqueson finally kicks the bucket…” or “What do you think Uncle Walter left us in his will…?” So when one hits close to home, as it did recently, they gear up to do it right.
Brian’s grandfather passed away on the Friday, so we headed to Smiths Falls to participate in the two vistitations on Sunday, and the funeral Monday morning. Being only the grand-daughter-in-law, my job was to go and support Brian. Stand in an awkward line next to a dead body, shake hands with 5,000 people I don’t know and will likely never see again, make other people feel awkward by having to offer condolences to some chick they’ve never seen before and will likely never see again… that’s how I like to spend a Sunday afternoon!
My brother-in-law, (also a grandkid-in-law, as he’s married to Brian’s sister), he totally loves it. Gets right into it. Puts on the face, is all about the two-handed handshake, it’s really quite impressive. His wife kept giving him outs to leave, but noooo…he wanted to stay. Weird.
So, to pass the time, I made jokes. Just little ones, and not always about dead people. Just a passing comment about the blue hair coming through, or the really funky comb-over on my father-in-law’s best friend. Brian thought they were hilarious! We had a great time! He even commented later that we hadn’t laughed together like that in a long time. Good times. Nothing like a funeral to help a marriage along.
The best was during the actual service, though. That ol’ standby Psalm 23 was read, and at the end the pastor invoked those words “and surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life.” I leaned over to Brian and my I-love-funerals brother-in-law and very quietly quipped: “Well, goodness and mercy I don’t mind, but who the heck is Shirley?”
It’s amazing how a good belly laugh supplies tears that are just like sobbing. Brian and I went through a whole box of tissues while silently convulsing against one another. My brother-in-law semi-smiled, and my mother-in-law turned and glared at me. Uh oh. Game over. I felt like a kid being scolded in class. Personally, I think she laughed later.
I just don’t find funerals or memorial services to be the horribly solemn occasions everyone else seems to think they are. Okay, let me modify that, slightly. The service itself may be a solemn event, but that entirely depends on who it is, and who's attending. When my father passed away, my brother and I had the lovely young lady at Low’s in stitches with our wisecracks. The service itself was, well, a memorial after all, but still fairly lighthearted, and we had a good party afterwards. My dad would have loved every minute of it all.
When my mother passed away three months later, my brother and I casually sat down with the same lovely young lady at Low’s and announced that we were just there “for the usual.” Come on, that’s funny. (Just so you don’t think I have no heart whatsoever, I have never been as devastated in my life as I was at her service. No jokes there. I couldn’t even speak.)
But overall, they just don’t break me up. And I’m old enough to have been to a few, now. Some would say it’s my defense mechanism, my way of dealing with my grief and pain. Some would say I am irreverent and don’t respect the dead. I argue no to both. I am not a person who suppresses emotions in any way, so if sad needs to be, then sad I’ll be. If happy wants to be, then happy I’ll be. I have a great respect for the dead. They’re definitely someplace I don’t want to be! I have an overwhelming fear of dying, and to stare it in the face is pretty startling. I pray for souls that have passed on, and am confident that what has happened is all part of a plan that is much larger that I am. As Dumbledore says in the first Harry Potter – “Death is but the next great adventure.”
I’m heading to my in-laws this weekend. I’m sure to get a little talking to, and I’ll deal with that as it comes. If it gets tense, I’ll just deflect the conversation away from me altogether by asking who they think will be next to go. That oughta keep ‘em going for hours. Another adventure…
