Writing Your Own Eulogy

Although this post is dated Saturday, its really Monday.

I lied.

You may wonder why I would bother. Its just that I wanted to have more than eight lousy posts for the month of July.

It appears that I'm Slackening Off. But don't be fooled by appearances, Dear Reader & a Half, inside I'm not.

Its Perilously Close to my Official Bedtime so I must now write in my Favourite Text Type, the Numbered Point.

1. Sadly, I've just been watching extracts from Arthur Miller's plays as well as an interview with the playwright himself. What a mistake.

Nothing depresses me more than watching even five minutes of 'Death of a Salesman'. I immediately identify with Willy Loman, even though I'm a different gender & haven't ever been a salesman, although I did work at a department store when I was young. Also, Arthur himself isn't exactly a barrel of laughs. He looks like, or I should say, he LOOKED like a bit of a Sad Sack. He's just told the interviewer that everything ends up badly for everyone in the end. I guess if you count death, he's right.

2. I'm in mourning for the end of Season 4 of 'Doc Martin'. It finished last saturday evening with me sobbing on the couch. It was v. cathartic.

Now I'm bereft. I need a new show but I can't think of anything.

Oh dear! I hope that no one will write a comment suggesting I Get a Life.

3. Behold my pure wool 'Bill Blass' tuxedo jacket I recently snatched/purloined/grabbed from 'Bednobs Etc'. I'm not sure what else I can say about it except that I wore it last friday to my ex-father-in-law's funeral & rather inappropriately felt like a million bucks in it.

While we're on the topic, it was the best funeral that I've ever been to, although I'm not in the habit of rating them. The problem with funerals is that they are either:

a. V. sad.

b. Boring.

c. Inaccurate. Like the speakers (or are they called 'eulogisers'?) say all this stuff about the Dead Person that bears little or no resemblance to the person you knew. Like the person was a Complete Saint when in fact they were a Boring Toad.

d. All of the above.

My Ex-Father-In-Law's name was Ted Kennedy, which thrilled me to the bone because my Second Favourite Kennedy as in President Kennedy was in fact Teddy. He was not a religious man, so God's Name was never mentioned during the 90 minute service at a Crematorium Chapel in a bush setting in the Central Coast.

Instead, Teddy's children & grandchildren which included Gumby, my ex-husband, & Maeflower, my daughter made wonderful speeches which made me laugh & cry & made me realise some things about the man that I didn't know before. And Ted's life wasn't sugar-coated. Everyone told the truth about him without being too too brutal.

I think that's the Perfect Combination for writing a eulogy, in case you were looking for some pointers.

Of course now, I'm wondering what I'd say if I was writing my own. Perhaps I could borrow what Arthur Miller has just said about his ex-wife, Marilyn Monroe: After suffering terrible abandonment & abuse as a child & being unwanted by her mentally ill mother, things turned out badly for her, as they do for everyone eventually. But she had enormous courage.

But it wouldn't be quite true.