I recently completed a book called Death: A History of Man's Obsessions and Fears by Robert Wilkins. It goes through some of the subjects we all think about at some point and explains them in great detail: pain at death, being buried alive, grave-robbing, cremation, dissection, tombs, etc. etc. The best part is there's lots n' lots of mummies and stuff like that. Mummies rock! Bad teeth and all!
But anyway, all of this has me thinking of my own mortality and what I would like to happen when I die. I spent long hours thinking it over and here is some of the things I came up with: 1. I don't want to have a big elaborate funeral. My own mother's funeral was a bare essentials-type affair and it cost a small fortune. Hell, I'd much rather not have all that crap and then Sparkle will have a nice healthy life insurance payment for her very own. 2. I don't want a "funeral home viewing", chapel service or graveside service. No limos, no flowers, no creepy goth funeral home dudes waiting at the door to greet people with just the right amount of friendliness and sympathy. 3. I want to be cremated. I want my ashes scattered at sea, the ocean I love. Or perhaps the woods by the river where I spent so much of my youth. 4. A memorial service to take place after the initial "mourning" period would be okay, as long as they serve lots of beer and play music I like no matter how crazy it makes everyone. I think a ceremonial eating of Spaghettios (with Meatballs) would top everything off nicely and be a fitting memorial.
So I inform Sparkle of my final wishes and looks at me incrediously. WHAAAAAT? She had two words........No. Way.
According to Sparkle, I must be buried. Why? Because if I'm cremated and scattered at sea, then I'll be fish food. And not only that but the ocean is "nasty". And rotting underground in a coffin is less nasty? Yes, because they embalm you and your body is preserved. WRONG. I now know from reading my handy-dandy book that embalming is done to preserve you only long enough to get your ass in the ground. If you want to be preserved forever, you need to see someone in Egypt......if they even remember HOW to do mummies.
Sparkle tells me that if that is the case, then I must be buried and rot underground.....because otherwise she won't have a grave to visit. Yeah, she won't have a grave to visit maybe 5 or 6 times in her entire life, if that. So she can stand there mournfully for 3 and a half minutes and then get back in the car and leave. Sparkle counter-argues that it beats standing on the beach, gawking out to sea and contemplating my new existence as fish food.
And finally Sparkle completes her argument by informing me that OF COURSE there will be the full array of funerary services.....because there is no WAY she is going to be denied all the attention and sympathy she is going to receive from the general public. Your mother only dies once, after all. Its an important social event, a time to wear the latest mourning fashions and dab at one's tears daintily while basking in the supportive circle of love that friends and relatives provide (while secretly hating you because you look so hot in that designer black dress). We are at an impasse. I don't know what to do. I won't be alive to defend myself. My carcass is going underground to rot whether I like it or not, my spirit eternally trapped in a box. However, something tells me Girlfriend will change her mind once a funeral home totals the figures for her.
