That Time I Cried at a Random Stranger’s Funeral

I celebrated my birthday recently. I'm still young in common terms, but I found myself with this one nagging thought that seemed to remain for weeks and weeks with no definite, affirmative answer: Am I doing this right? Am I doing Life right?

I have a stable job, a home, a relationship with someone I love, who loves me, I'm clean, and for good measure I'll add in that I'm a parent to an awfully sweet rescue shepherd. Yet still, “Am I doing this right?”

I've always said that I wanted to plan my funeral, and I don't mean it to sound grim, but it's kind of exciting. The thought that I can make it whatever I want. Play some nice songs, lots of pictures, people who knew me telling funny stories about me being a dork or how I thought I was funny but wasn't. All of that. I feel like it would really be a good time. And I guess I'm kind of sad that I won't be there for it. To hear the difference that I made. To hear about how I'll be missed. Or what will be different in people's lives. Not that I'm gone and everything falls apart, but that there is a space left from it. There's a gap that only I could fill. I guess that would give me a fuller picture of who I am. And I guess I wish it didn't have to wait until I was gone.

But having some kind of romp around like that while you're there has the feeling more of an ego show: “Tell me how great I am.” I guess the difference is that that would be for someone who knew they were great or cocky or whatever and just got pumped up hearing other people say it over and over again. For me, it'd be like attending a Welcome meeting for someone I've never met. And I can only go by what other people are saying.

I remember doing that once. I looked in the newspaper one Sunday, saw a funeral for a man that was in the town bordering mine, and I just went. It turns out he was a Jewish man who I later found out was one of the developers or early pioneers of Colgate. I heard the rabbi talk about him, and I got in touch with the impact he made on the people in his life. I cried, and then it was over and I left.

I guess that experience gave me an interesting perspective. I do think of it from time to time when I'm brushing my teeth. That this man was real to so many people. To me, he was just a story, some vague, unpersonified being that had something to do with the creation of my toothpaste. And he didn't know me, while he was still alive. So it was quite an interesting Sunday, that week.