This is what I thought would happen at my grandmother’s funeral.

 1) The immediate family would go to the graveside to see the urn (she was cremated) and say a final farewell to her.

2) That same evening, friends and family would gather at my aunt’s large house for a wake.  At some point, we’d all congregate in their circular living room/den/music room space (there’s easily room for fifty people).  My Aunt Jane (our hostess) as the eldest surviving child, would say a few words.  The rest of her siblings would follow suit.  And then the floor would be opened up for those of us assembled to share memories.  Each of us would benefit from hearing something we might not have known about my grandmother.  We’d get a more spherical view of her life.  We would celebrate who she had been to us.  Perhaps to finish, we’d all raise our glasses in a toast.

This is what actually happened:

1) We drove to the cemetery to see the gravesite.  My grandmother’s urn was to be placed at the foot of my grandfather’s grave.  It was a fairly brisk day, and the wind was blowing, making it seem even chillier.  I hadn’t thought to bring a coat, since it was eighty degrees when I left Portland.  Everyone looked about as uncomfortable as I felt.  There were perhaps twenty people in attendance.  My uncle John said a few words honoring his parents; it was difficult to hear him because just on the other side of the road, a large piece of machinery was digging a gravel pit, so his words were overshadowed by a loud KA-CHUNKA, KA-CHUNKA, KA-CHUNKA.  My aunt Jane then read a eulogy which was barely audible over the machine, and much of which was carried away by the wind. 

 She then asked my mother to say a few words; my mother, who had had the same idea about the wake that I did, had left her prepared speech back at the house for later.  She had planned to tell a very delicate and exquisite anecdote that did not lend itself to being screamed into the wind in competition with an industrial shovel.  She paraphrased the main point of what she’d intended to say, which was that my grandmother’s example taught her that even the smallest thing was worth doing well.  Considering how poorly-organized the present occasion seemed, this was nicely ironic.

When she was done, Aunt Jane said to Uncle John: “Perhaps you’d like to put the urn in the ground.”  I don’t think we were supposed to do this — I think the cemetery attendants do it.  But he could hardly refuse.  Uncle John is seventy, with a bad heart, and not exactly agile.   The urn was heavy, and the grave at least four feet deep.  Simply throwing the thing in the hole hardly seemed the thing to do, so his wife held onto the back of his pants to keep him from falling in while he lowered the urn into the grave.  We then passed around a bouquet of flowers; each of us threw one into the hole, rather unceremoniously, while the machine clunked away in the background.  I had difficulty restraining a mildly-hysterical urge to start laughing . . . the whole thing was so backward and ludicrous.  However, I managed to contain myself.

2) Later that evening, we had a lot of food.  People came over and ate it.  We talked to each other, but not about my grandmother. Then they all left and we did dishes.  I felt bemused and rather cheated.

My grandmother was a fastidious, meticulous woman who did everything exactly right; if she was present in spirit, I’m sure she was thinking:  “I should have left detailed instructions.  I should have known they wouldn’t get it right.”