FUNERAL DISAPPOINTMENT
I attended a funeral the other day and I must say I was disappointed. I had just had an article entitled "Spice up your Obituary" published the same week as the funeral. The article dealt with the idea that a person had to have an interesting life, in order to have an interesting obituary.
I did not know the person who had died, but he was a veteran. The word quickly went out by e-mail to the local veteran community. One of the points in the message was, there would be no obituary. If it had not been for all the old veterans showing up, it would have been a very poorly attend funeral.
One of the big mistakes I made was, I failed to wear my uniform. I got it out the night before. When I got dressed the next morning, I skipped the uniform and put my suit on instead. I have been retired from the Air Force for ten years but I keep a current uniform ready for occasions just like this veteran's funeral. The last two funerals I attended, I wore my uniform. I truly regret not putting my uniform on that morning. This will not happen again.
This person was not just a veteran but he had been a career military officer. He had over 20 years of service to his country. There was no church service bulletin to help tell this veteran's life story, to the people who attended his funeral. I still don't know the man's history and I really did want to know. We shared the same career field in the Air Force, but he was about 20 years older than me. Because of this limited information, I can assume he was a Vietnam era veteran. I can assume he spent time stationed overseas in strange and interesting places. I can assume he met interesting people and did interesting things in both his military and civilian life. But I really don't know.
No one spoke about this veteran except the minister, who conducted the service and he admitted that he did not know the deceased veteran. The minister did a standardized, right out of the book, funeral service and then had trouble getting through that successfully. A couple of times he stopped and said "oops my mistake." I was setting there, wanting to scream.
As I said I did not know the deceased veteran, but I am convinced with just a little bit of the man's history, I could have giving him a more personalized final send off. There was no doubt the immediate family was grieving and in pain, at the loss of their loved one. So I again have to assume that people came to the funeral because they genuinely wanted to be there. This goes back to the issue of an interesting life, generates an interesting obituary.
Please do not get me wrong, I do not expect to go to a funeral and be entertained with a major production based on a person's life. I have been to people's funerals that were just plain and boring. In most cases this was because the person lived that type of life. But we are talking about a career military veteran who served his country for a major portion of his life. He had the personal history to warrant a very interesting obituary and a fact filled funeral service. I would suggest this is a learning tool for me, and my fellow veterans.
None of us like to talk about death, but if you are an old veteran it is inevitable and getting close. It is time to take charge of your future memorial and start documenting your life and your military service. It is also time to start talking to fellow veterans about this issue and communicating with family.
If you are in the position to assist the family of a recently deceased veteran in the planning of a memorial, offer your services - but don't push. A lot of family members don't even think about a veteran's military service at funeral time, especially if the veteran was on active duty for a few years, say 50 years ago. This is where you can help with the suggestions of military related poems; readings and music - but don't push. You might offer to say a few words. If you can assist a veteran in his or her final "posting" please do and wear your uniform if you can.