Comment by hbgwine on 26/02/2025 at 00:39 UTC

48 upvotes, 4 direct replies (showing 4)

View submission: What’s a better alternative to a funeral?

A group of us who are getting old decided that we will have “funerals” at age 72 for each of us so we can drink, tell stories and best of all, the (not) departed can revel in it. First one is this July.

Replies

Comment by waxtwister at 26/02/2025 at 00:48 UTC

11 upvotes, 0 direct replies

That's the best idea I've heard in a while

Comment by cowPoke1822 at 26/02/2025 at 01:21 UTC

5 upvotes, 0 direct replies

This is a wonderful idea!

Comment by nakedonmygoat at 26/02/2025 at 05:06 UTC

3 upvotes, 1 direct replies

I love this idea! It reminds me of the MASH episode where the army declares Hawkeye dead, so to cheer him up, the camp holds a wake, with an opportunity for people to express their thoughts and the "deceased" to give a rebuttal!

In a more somber vein, there's the Linda Pastan poem which follows.

"An Early Afterlife"

Why don’t we say good-bye right now In the fallacy of perfect health before whatever is going to happen happens.

We could perfect our parting, like those characters in *On the Beach* who said farewell in the shadow of the bomb as we sat watching, young and holding hands at the movies.

We could use the loving words we otherwise might not have time to say.

We could hold each other for hours in a quintessential dress rehearsal.

Then we could just continue for however many years were left.

The ragged things that are coming next— arteries closing like rivers silting over or rampant cells stampeding us to the exit— would be like postscripts to our lives and wouldn’t matter.

And we could bask in an early afterlife of ordinary days, impervious to the inclement weather already in our long-range forecast.