How strange is it that I’ve already selected all the songs I want played at my funeral?
More or less bizarre than the fact that my 7-year-old daughter is privy to that information, plus she knows what type of flowers I want draped on my coffin before it’s placed six feet under.
What? I didn’t tell her what I wanted to be buried in.
Calm down; it’s not as macabre and morose as you might think.
My young daughter has attended a number of funerals in short life, including her paternal grandmother’s and my grandmother’s. Needless to say, she is quite familiar with the rituals associated with wakes and Requiem Masses. Consequently, I don’t think twice about commenting on songs we’ve heard sung at various funerals or verbalizing my preference for certain floral arrangements and where I would like them displayed at my own “celebration of life.”
I thought about my funeral-related conversations with my daughter the other night while viewing a commercial for the latest episode of Keeping Up with the Kardashians.
Yeah, I know, you wouldn’t be caught dead watching that show, but humor me a bit.
A clip from Sunday’s episode shows family matriarch, Kris, calling a family meeting to discuss the ideal resting place for the entire Kardashian-Jenner clan. The mother of six attempts to get her kids, Rob, Khloe, Kim, Kendall, and Kylie to listen as she rattles off details for her own funeral.
“If something happens to me, you’re going to be hopefully sad about it and you’re not going to make the right decision,” Mama Kris tells her disinterested children. “There’s a lot to do and I want to make sure everything’s organized if something happens.”
Daughter Kim tries to bury her mother’s topic of conversation by injecting her own reality TV reasoning: “What’s the right decision? You get in a coffin, you get in the ground – what do you want me to do? Tell me what color [casket] you want and what kind of pillow-top [to buy]. Do you want Tempur-pedic?”
The mocking makes for good TV, but how does it translate in real life?
Have you given your kids specific directives for your funeral?