When my dad died a while back, he always said he wanted a wicker casket, because he was going to be cremated and he didn't want anything expensive. Ended up getting him a rather substantial one nonetheless, he died so sudden we didn't have time for anything else. I remember that the visitation was more irritating than anything, three days of me and my family tooling around keeping up appearances, though the show of support was rather amazing by some folks; my entire elementary class from that year appeared, as did two of my teachers. You're absolutely right about people standing around, nodding and smiling. Traditional western funerals are expensive, cumbersome, tradition-laden beasts of burden, usually that burden placed squarely on the shoulders of the bereaved. We should work on that.
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Date: 2008-04-25 07:04 pm (UTC)Ended up getting him a rather substantial one nonetheless, he died so sudden we didn't have time for anything else.
I remember that the visitation was more irritating than anything, three days of me and my family tooling around keeping up appearances, though the show of support was rather amazing by some folks; my entire elementary class from that year appeared, as did two of my teachers.
You're absolutely right about people standing around, nodding and smiling. Traditional western funerals are expensive, cumbersome, tradition-laden beasts of burden, usually that burden placed squarely on the shoulders of the bereaved.
We should work on that.