The Big Finish

Spare me from no-fuss funerals

When a form asks me to tick a box adjacent to my age bracket, naturally I now have to scroll way down the list to ‘60 and over’. While it’s disconcerting to see the number of vacant boxes left to fill has diminished to, well, one (dead) I’m even less thrilled about the kind of direct marketing that’s winging its way to my door. Why advertisers think when you turn 60, they’re aiming at someone sucking a Werther’s Original and sharing a footbath with Eammon Holmes, I don’t know. It’s a good job Sweaty Betty sends me brochures. At least they still think I may need something to wear for my drum and bass workouts.

While I’m genuinely grateful to the NHS for the bowel cancer testing kit (although I pity the poor posties who have to handle the return package, surely knowing what lurks within) the most depressing mailshots are those pressing me to finance my own funeral plan pronto, apparently to save my family shelling out any unnecessary funds from the estate I’ve bequeathed them. I don’t even get a free pen.

The latest misery-missive made me pause for thought. It explained how direct cremation works, the kind of funeral made famous by David Bowie, where the deceased is attended to without fuss or fanfare, the ashes duly returned to the next of kin. While I understand this option might be favoured by some who aren’t religious or whose aged relatives couldn’t face the distress, I balked at the suggestions of what mourners could do instead of showing up at a stuffy church to sing How Great Thou Art, one of which was ‘go on a picnic’! Call me old fashioned but I hope I’m remembered in a way that has a touch more gravitas than the ceremonial unwrapping of a cheese and pickle sandwich at Virginia Water.

It wasn’t so long ago that most send-offs were the essence of dour formality, women dabbing eyes under hats, men fiddling with ties, congregations mumbling hymns they only half knew, with everyone’s sights firmly set on a schooner of cream sherry. But funerals have been evolving at a rapid rate. Take one of our local funeral directors. It’s called Exit Here and its blue logo is in a handwritten script on a white background, quite the transformation from the traditional undertaker with its blacked-out windows showcasing a granite vase filled with maroon chrysanths.

Look, I’m all for personalising a funeral, especially when it’s in the tragic shadow of someone dying young. In those dreadful circumstances, you want to see bright colours. To celebrate their spirit, their passions. A stark, dark funeral is too heart-breaking to contemplate.

I even pushed the black-edged envelope a tad for my old Dad. He was a joker, so in his eulogy, I said, ‘He was always the life and soul of the party…even if he hadn’t been invited’. Which was true - he once gate-crashed an event and joined a line-up to shake Prince Philip’s hand. I also took on board his request that at the end of the service, his coffin shouldn’t disappear through curtains like a suitcase at Heathrow. So given he was a jazz aficionado, I hired a saxophonist to stand by him and play Somewhere Over the Rainbow as we filed out.

But how far will funerial boundaries reach? Ok, so we haven’t caught up with Japan where a robot can perform the priestly honours or ashes can be housed in a giant golf ball (I can hear it now; “In the name of the father, the son and into the ‘ole he goes”) but even here, coffins are shaking off the look of a 1990’s fitted kitchen. Sustainable willow varieties are rather lovely. Although personally, I’d pass on a casket that’s covered in Swarovski crystals – reminds me too much of a Lamborghini parked outside Harrods.

And while it’s right and proper music should reflect the deceased tastes, when your choice might be anything from Iron Maiden to Renée and Renato, when does the ceremony stop being a funeral and start becoming, erm, entertainment? When does the British stiff upper lip segue into Britain’s Got Talent? As a horrified Charlotte in Sex and the City said at Miranda’s mother’s funeral when she saw the lairy floral tribute that had been delivered, “Those flowers were supposed to say, ‘We’re so sorry, we love you,’ not ‘You’re dead, let’s disco’.

On balance, I wouldn’t want my funeral to be customised at the expense of customs. So while I hope guests chortle at the antics I got up to, I’d still like a bit of ear-curdling organ music. A hint of musty hymnbooks. And to all the guests, you’re getting a glass of Amontillado whether you like it or not.