Funerals

At some point as an adult I realized that when I went to a funeral, the mourners remembered that I was there. It was of meaning to them, no matter how limited the interaction was.

I am a shy person by nature, but it seemed to me at that point that showing up for the important things (graduations, weddings, baptisms, funerals) was something that was worth my doing because the meaning that it had for others was way beyond the cost to me, and so I started committing to showing up. Sometimes logistics prevented me, but almost all of the time they didn't and I chose to show up.

I've been to two funerals this month. Perhaps my age leads me to have more funerals than I used to but that's not obvious to me. In neither case did I know the decedent that well, which is pretty common. My relationship is usually with someone mourning, for whom I want to be present.

I do remember when I was department chair many years ago going to funerals for the death of a department member's parent twice in as many weeks. They were at opposite ends of the spectrum, from wailing at the loss of a loved one too soon to celebration of a life well-lived.  The first kind of a funeral has an emotional cost in attending, and my spirit will sink for weeks. Attendance there seems to be more necessary to help those grieving.

The second kind of funeral lifts my spirits tremendously, showing me that it is possible to lead a good (never perfect, but good) life where the person was part of something (a family, an organization, a cause, a career) that was larger than just the person. I fail daily but this is the kind of life I have sought.

Today I went to the funeral of an adult child of a colleague. It was very very unsettling, as it always is when a child predeceases the parent. The older the child, the more of a life and potential is shown, the more wrong it feels. The adult child was in their forties, and the death was related to their depression. The ceremony helped us get through the acknowledgment of the person's life but I am struggling to get my bearings and I expect to continue to do so for days. I cannot conceive of how the parents are processing the loss and I share however peripherally their sorrow. I'm glad I was there. For them and for my other colleagues who came.