Planning Your Dream Funeral

November 15, 2014
Day 199

If you had some free time right now--or really whenever--would you consider jotting down a few last wishes about what kind of a funeral you'd like?

I don't!  I just liked the pic and caption.

Maybe you'd just like to be sure you get that bright pink coffin you've always thought would be cool, or you want that one perfect song to be played during the wake or Shiva.  Maybe you want to be sure relative x doesn't get a dime of whatever money you leave behind, or that friend z is notified finally about your deepest, darkest secrets.

We all have these little thoughts in the back of our heads, but how many of us ever get that perfect sendoff we've sometimes fantasized about?  How many wakes, Shivas, or funerals have you attended where things just felt a little bit flatter than you think your loved one would have preferred?

If you've read this far, you've already had more than enough time to write down a sentence or two detailing your last wishes.  A Last Will And Testament is ideal, but you could at least just start with, "The cash is buried under the floorboard in the attic."

For me, well, I'm not sure what I want.  I told Andy recently that there's a passage about entering Heaven from the end of my second book that might be nice, but in general I just want people to look at my life through pictures and videos, maybe even my craziest ones on YouTube, and see what a wonderful life I lived.  I want my loved ones to cry if they need to, or laugh if they need to, whatever will make them most comfortable, and just take time to appreciate the life I lived, through all my ups and downs, all my successes and failures.  A little Broadway music wouldn't suck either.

So seriously, let's all do this.  It's not morbid to plan our funerals.  It's natural, and more than that, it's tremendously helpful to our loved ones who have to figure out what we would have wanted.  Just no pink coffins for me, please.  The cheapest wooden box you can legally use will work fine.  I don't mind a cheap coffin, and you can dress me in a $50 tie if you think I need more color, okay? 

Now do me a favor.  Send me a private message about which floorboard in the attic the cash is hidden under.  You know, just in case?