their pain
no words
just empty-feeling
niceties
exchanged
after the service
has ended
and possibly
a small plate
of scones.
Tag Archive: funeral
i logged on to the internetweb late last nite after a busy day needing to write an article before i went to sleep and was greeted by the sad news of Philip Seymour Hoffman’s passing…
i did what i do any time i hear a famous person has died, which is type ‘Philip Seymour Hoffman dead scam’ into Uncle Google to check on the legitimacy of the news and sadly could tell pretty quickly that it was a true account. What made it even worse [and the same thing happened a week before Paul Walker’s death ironically] was that there had been a Philip Seymour Hoffman is dead scam earlier in the week. But all the major news outlets were now reporting that at age 46, the academy-award winning actor had been found dead, with a huge possibility of it being caused by drugs.
and i read a whole page worth of what other celebrities were tweetering and saying in response to his death, with so many of them calling him, ‘One of the finest actors of his generation’ and i started to wonder if he ever got to hear that live…
recently i shared this post about my 40th birthday party that just happened and how my wife secretly organised a boob cake for me [yes, that!] because it was something i had wanted to have at my funeral one day [can’t even remember how that idea started but probably from the perspective of creating awkwardness vibes from beyond the grave] and filled the celebration with other things i wanted to have at my funeral, made all the more better because i actually got to experience them.
the point being that so often we hear things at funerals that the dead people never got to hear while they were alive, and while we like to entertain the idea that they are peacefully stretched out on a fluffy white cloud listening to our every word, we don’t know that that is the case and it may well be that they get to hear nothing that we say once they have passed on.
Don’t wait until it is too late. Find and create opportunities to say your things to your people now. Philip Seymour Hoffman was 46 and I’m sure no one saw it coming.
Whether it is a handwritten letter [how special are those these days] or a card, an email or a conversation or whether it’s taking the lead of tbV and organising a celebration [does it even need to be for a birthday?] where you make space to speak life and appreciation and get to tell stories about your friend or family member while they can still appreciate them.
thanks to tbV and a whole bunch of my friends, about a week ago i got my boob cake and i got to hear stories and relive memories and be hugely encouraged by what people have seen and experienced with me and it was so life giving. who do you need to do this for? don’t wait too long…
Yes. A Boob cake.
40 is the new 39 plus 1
This just got serious. And a werebat.
Great friends, good times.
my cousin Laura died two days ago.
she was 30. recently married. then cancer reared its ugly head. absolute tragedy.
just before she went into hospital i did get to send her an email and let her know that i loved her and was praying for her and her family and hoping for a miracle from God [which sadly never happened, not how i was hoping anyways]
so it was really sad, but there was also a strong sense of love and support of friends and family surrounding her in the months leading up to her death.
last nite i went onto facebook and saw message after message, from a whole variety of unlinked friends of mine across the country, mourning the death of Burry Stander, aged 25, a South African olympian mountain biker who was killed on Thursday while training after being hit by a minibus taxi
i didn’t know Burry, but a lot of my friends clearly did [either personally or just as fans and supporters]
i doubt any of them got to send him an email before he died.
for the most part, we just don’t know when we are going to die. or when those around us are.
FUNERALS
i have a love hate relationship with funerals.
i know they happen because someone died and so they are meant to be times of sadness, but for the most part i have enjoyed the ones i have been to… when they have been celebrations of the person’s life, rather than simply testaments to the fact that someone has died. i especially love the open mic. time when it happens when friends and family are invited to come forward and share a story about the person they love who has passed on.
but i am also always pretty bummed that the one person who really should be hearing the stories is not officially around to hear them. so one of my big dreams in life [and i guess some might think it’s a pretty sick one] is to come back to life once my funeral has started [open casket] and be able to eavesdrop on what people are saying [and let’s be honest to be able to shout “that’s a load of crap” if someone gets up and starts eulogising me who never had much good to say about me when i was alive. [with dreams like that, maybe it’s a good thing i don’t sleep more?]
the point of today’s scribing is this – how much more amazing would it be if we got to tell people just how much we love them and how much they mean to us, while they are still around to appreciate it?
i want to invite you, to challenge you, to do that! just for one person [for now at least and then maybe someone else tomorrow or next week] who you really care for and who maybe you haven’t told recently [or at all] how much you love them.
but i also want you to share with me who you do it to [i want to hear relationship so not the person’s name but simply a label of friend, family member, work colleague, girlfriend… whoever they are to you] and i want you to pass this challenge on to three other people [and i want to know their names] to encourage them to do the same…
so decide on one person in your life who you want to encourage [verbally, by email, by handwritten note, carrier pigeon?] and three people who you want to send this challenge on and in the comments section of this blog write it down like this:
encourage: my cousin
challenge: Ted, Bill, Napoleon
and then go and do it.
‘because He lives, i can face tomorrow
because He lives, all fear has gone
because i know, yes i know, He holds the future
and life is worth the living, just because He lives’
i attended a funeral last nite for one of my ex youth guys (well a pre-funeral actually as the funeral is on saturday but this was called a ‘roer diens?’ or something and was an opportunity to celebrate his life and give testimony) who was stabbed to death on the weekend
tbV and i were two of about 4 white people in a hall filled with coloured people fromJamestown where he lived and where it happened – i had not really known him that well but what stood out to me was that he was a really good natured young dude with great manners and a consistent (with a hint of mischief) smile and positive attitude – but when his mom got up and spoke it almost floored me
she basically got up and said how Adrian is safe now and he is with God and so there is no need for revenge and then basically begged his friends and guys from the community to not add to the bloodshed and tragedy that has already happened
i would imagine when your precious child is taken away from you that the natural response would be that someone must pay and that the guy responsible must suffer – his mom is a follower of Jesus though and i know that is what prompted that kind of response
i hear the voice of Jesus, hanging bloodied and beaten from the cross, designated Roman instrument of torture and slow death, gasping out, ‘Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do’ and just pray that more of us will really ‘get’ that heart and live it for real in a broken and hurting world.
as Gandhi said, ‘an eye for an eye ends up leaving the whole world blind’
so i have decided to try and be less judging of people this year – i think a couple of times this last year it hit me how judgemental i have become – i don’t think i used to be that way but definitely an area i want to work on – i guess this last week nailed it home as i attended a funeral (my best mates mom in law) and a wedding (our wedding photographeress and friends of ours) and heard two people described as humble, non judgemental people… there is just something so attractive about being described that way… and more NBly, being that way and it’s definitely something i want to aim at in 2010 – not so much a resolution as a new years revolution one hopes (and i am that one!)
the preach at the wedding was by a dude who in the past preached one of the dodgiest sermons i ever heard – well maybe bad as opposed to dodgy – not the worst sermon ever which goes to guy-who-preached-on-divorce-at-a-wedding and went on and on about it and how it’s bad for the kids and blah blah blah tragic tragic downer of a sermon – a whole sermon on greet each other with a brotherly kiss – actually just incredibly random and i will never get those minutes of my life back – but yesterday at the wedding he preached one of the best wedding sermons i have heard – just full of life and truth and real and relevant and obviously well prepared as he had little gifts they had to open as he messaged (tbV’s favourite being the red and yellow cards to use in an argument) and so i went to him afterwards and told him and then chatted more to him and his wife at the after party.
there is a tendency to write people off and i think judging people really helps feed that tendency and i don’t think it’s ever (hardly) valid to write people off – i think i know that cos i have seen people write me off along the way and don’t want to feel i am worth writing off – and also i don’t think anyone wakes up in life and decides to be a chop altho some people do seem to graduate to that position along the way
so something about trying to see the absolute good in people and judging less and being a generally nicer person – and also gossiping less (wow, busy year ahead for me) – cos that is something else i have slipped into and i hate it and am not sure where it has come from. freak! there is a lot of horrible in me come to think of it. God, You and i have our work cut out this year. So empowered by being loved by a God who accepts me as i am in terms of loving me, but refuses to allow me to remain in that condition cos He constantly challenges me to be and do better and jump higher – may those all be categorisations of 2010.
Irresistibly Fish 