(Post 25 of 33 in my 16-hour shift for the Secular Student Alliance Blogathon.)
8:00 pm EDT
Hey, it’s your funeral again. Your family and friend are gathered in an appropriately non-liturgical setting. This is your last chance to inflict your will on a captive audience. You’re clasping your hands in anticipation. There will be readings, poetry, maybe even a nice thing said by a loved one or two. Tears will be shed, since you died at the height of pollen season. A couple of singles will hook up — one of those circle-of-life things.
Your spouse and his/her date are there, looking at their watches. Your children are lined up in the front pew, grumbling about their grandchildren’s complete inability to control their grandchildren, who are running around the pew chasing after their own damn kids. Then, at last, the music begins.
So…what is it?
I’ve been a musician of one sort or another since I was ten, so when it comes to selecting music for an important event, the pressure is on. I picked the music for our wedding, and it worked, we’re still married. But what should I ask to have played at my funeral to be sure I stay dead?
If the idea is to somehow capture what I was all about and what I loved about being in the world for a while, the Gounod Ave Maria, while achingly lovely, won’t do. But I go back and forth on what will do. I need to put some thought into the music selection so my wife can spend the three days after my demise on eHarmony.com instead of my iTunes.
But first I want to hear your ideas. What do you want played at your funeral?
(By the way, as promised, this post has been written completely naked. Go back and see if you can tell. Then donate a lot of money to SSA, I’m out of gimmicks.)