Today was a whirlwind of cleaning the house, telling folks that Dad died, talking to the undertaker and the minister who will be officiating his service, coming back to Halifax to find as many pictures of Dad I could email my niece as possible.
I have been asked, and have agreed, to write and present a eulogy for my father at his funeral on Friday. I have been in Toastmasters for 18 and a half years. I have done speeches in front of large groups of people, some of them not too terribly friendly. I am scared crapless about speaking at my father’s funeral, but I have agreed to do so, and am not about to chicken out.
I have written a rough draft of the eulogy. It is not ready for public consumption. I will show it to the immediate family sometime on Wednesday. They will doubtless ask for changes because we all want it to be perfect. My sisters are also welcome to speak in front of the crowd. I don’t know if they will. It is their decision.
This is a link to my father’s obituary. It will run in the Halifax Chronicle Herald on Wednesday May 5th. It will run for only one day. I will, in a week or so, discuss the reasons why we are only running it for a single day. It will make you roll your eyes, and possibly tick you off a bit. The business of funerals is becoming clearer to me.
Wednesday will involve the women of the family compiling pictures of Dad for some kind of collage that only women have the ability to prepare. Men, not even the gayest of the gay, would know how to do this. My brother-in-law and I will look on in awe and admiration as we serve them wine and stay the Hell out of their way.
Dad loved these women, his daughters, his granddaughter, Patricia. I know he’d be delighted to see what they have up their girly sleeves.
More in a bit.
Bevboy
1 comment:
I'm really not envying you this task. I have not one clue of what we will do when my mom passes away. After more than a month of great improvement following her heart attack and the two toe amputations she had over the last six months, Mom had a setback with her foot care, and the doctors are scrambling to arrest the new wound on her foot before she has to consider another amputation. And while she is still in good spirits and is hopefully years away from the inevitable, it has really brought home to me how very little precious time we may have with her.
At least we bouth have good friends and family to fall back on, who can help us in times of trouble. God bless you, Bev (which is my mom's name, by the way [!]), and I'll be working on more of "The Letter" this weekend.
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